Grace OPC Sewickley PA

Sermon Book: Isaiah

The Terror of the LORD

About this sermon

Isaiah announces the day of the Lord against all that is proud and lofty, the cedars, the high towers, and the ships of Tarshish. On that day the Lord will humble the haughtiness of man, and people will flee into caves from the terror of the Lord and throw their idols to the moles and bats. The Lord alone will stand exalted; the redeemed will cast their crowns before him. The only refuge from that wrath is Jesus Christ, who took the wrath on himself, and his arms are open to sinners.

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Sermon transcript

Well, this morning we continue to consider this passage in Isaiah chapter 2, my sermon text being Isaiah 2 verses 6 through 22. I’m going to begin reading and fill out the context a little bit, but there is so much in this chapter we couldn’t just cover it in one week, so we’re going to again consider a prominent theme in this chapter of God’s Word, and that is the theme of the Lord. God’s Holy Word, Isaiah chapter 2, I’m going to begin reading at verse 5. O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord. For you have rejected the house of Jacob, because they are full of things from the East, and of fortune tellers like the Philistines, and they strike hands with the children of foreigners. Their land is filled with silver and gold, and there is no end to their treasures.

Their land is filled with horses, and there is no end to their chariots. Their land is filled with idols. They bow down to the work of their hands, to what their own fingers have made. So man is humbled, and brought low. Do not forgive them. Enter into the rock and hide in the dust from before the terror of the Lord, and from the splendor of his majesty. The haughty looks of man shall be brought low, and the lofty pride of men shall be humbled, and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day. For the Lord of hosts has a day against all that is proud and lofty, against all that is lifted up, and it shall be brought low, against all the cedars of Lebanon lofty and lifted up, and against all the oaks of Bashan, against all the lofty mountains, and against all the uplifted hills, against every high tower, and against every fortified wall, against all the ships of Tarshish, and against all the beautiful craft.

And the haughtiness of man shall be humbled, and the lofty pride of men shall be brought low, and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day, and the idols shall utterly pass away. And people shall enter the caves of the rocks, and the holes of the ground from before the terror of the Lord, and from the splendor of his majesty, when he rises to terrify the earth. In that day mankind will cast away their idols of silver, and their idols of gold, which they made for themselves to worship, to the moles and to the bats, to enter the caverns of the rocks, and the clefts of the cliffs from before the terror of the Lord, and from the splendor of his majesty, when he rises to terrify the earth. Stop regarding man in whose nostrils is breath, for of what account is he?

The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever. Let us pray. Our gracious Lord God and Heavenly Father, you are a glorious God, a majestic God, and Though Heavenly Father, you have befriended us in Christ, you are not our chum, you’re not our pal, you are our sovereign Lord. May we tremble before you in holy reverence and awe, even as we delight in you and receive of your goodness through Christ. We would pray that by your spirit you would be powerfully present in the preaching of your word this day. We ask once again, Lord, that you would set a guard over my lips, that I might speak only that which is faithful and true to your word. And we pray that your word would go forth in grace and power, and that you would implant your word in our souls, in the soil of our hearts, that it might bear forth much good fruit to your praise and honor and glory.

We pray all these things, Heavenly Father, in Jesus’ name and all of God’s people’s Amen, you may be seated. Again, the title of my sermon today is The Terror of the Lord, and there are six key words that the children can be listening for. The words judgment, fear, terror, grace, faith, and refuge. Well, dear friends, many today claim to love God, but few today seem to actually fear God. In fact, I suspect that the idea of God as a terrifying being would not even register on the spiritual radar screens of most folks today, including many professing Christians. Instead, most likely, it would be a completely foreign concept. The terror of God, God as a terrifying being, that would be a totally foreign concept to many. Many today seem to view God as a benign, mild man, or sort of grandfatherly figure who is being back, comfortably uninvolved in our lives, a sort of behind-the-scenes deity who will pretty much leave us alone to do our own thing and follow our own chosen path, unless of course we require a divine therapist or emotional support deity.

Then he’s right there with us until we’re ready to rise up from the therapist’s couch and get on with our lives, at which time he obligingly steps back into the shadows, into that divine closet of hiddenness and aloofness. The so-called God of popular imagination and spirituality today is a deity who basically says to people, you know what, don’t worry, don’t worry, hey, it’s fine, I love you no matter what, I’m certainly not going to hold you to any kind of moral standard, no, I don’t do that thing, I mean, I’m happy with you as you are, so you do you. The God of popular spirituality today is a God who always affirms and who never ever judges. He is a God who shrugs his shoulders at sin, who looks the other way and who basically says, eh, whatever, not a big deal.

He is a God who never holds anyone accountable, never requires his rational creatures to assume moral responsibility for their attitudes or their actions. He is a God who never treats people with the dignity of actually possessing personal moral agency. Now the theological belief system behind this popular contemporary view of God, this popular spirituality has sometimes been described as moralistic therapeutic deism. Moralistic because its tone is focused on morality and it’s basically a very preachy point of view that says, hey, be nice to each other. Certainly the scriptures say that we should treat our neighbor with love and dignity, but moralistic therapeutic deism, moralistic in its focus and moralizing in its thrust rather than redemptive. It is therapeutic in that the chief end of man according to this view of God is to attain personal happiness and good self-esteem.

And it is deism in the sense that the God of moralistic therapeutic deism is a distant God. He’s a God who kind of wound up the universe and it made it to run on its own and certainly doesn’t intervene unless we really, really want him to or need him to. He is sort of a spare tire God. You know, how often do you think when you’re driving down the road, how often do you think about the spare tire? When you have a flat tire, you’re glad for that spare tire to be there and in an emergency you can pull out that spare tire, but most of the time it’s back there and it’s uninvolved in your life and you can ignore it safely. Dear ones, our passage for this Lord’s Day morning from the book of the prophet Isaiah utterly smashes, utterly demolishes the popular modern false idol of moralistic therapeutic deism even as it also demolishes every other idol, every other sentimental shallow view of God.

Our text for this Lord’s Day morning sermon is an eschatological passage. It’s a passage about the doctrine of the end times. It’s a passage that points us to the ultimate end and goal of human history, of redemptive history. It is an eschatological passage that anticipates and predicts the day of the Lord, meaning that final judgment day. That final judgment day when Yahweh, the God of Israel, the true and living God, the holy one of Israel will humble all that is lofty and proud, will bring his holy wrath against the unrepentant wicked and who alone will be exalted on that final day. And as we’ve seen in this passage, if you were paying attention to the reading of this passage, one of the prominent themes of this judgment passage is the terror of the Lord. Brothers and sisters in Christ, in this age of moralistic therapeutic deism and other similar idolatries, we as God’s people we need to relearn and recapture a balanced biblical view of the fear and terror of the Lord.

And this actually, understanding the terror of the Lord will deepen our appreciation for the love and grace and mercy of the Lord. After all, the scriptures indicate that it is only as our hearts and our understandings and our consciences are gripped by the fear and terror of the Lord’s infinite majestic holiness, only then will we come to joyfully embrace and glory in the amazing grace, mercy, and goodness of the Lord that are given to us in the person and saving work of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Now as we approach our text for this Lord’s Day morning, I would again remind us that this is not Isaiah’s ideas. What we have in this passage is not man’s imagination about God or man’s conceptualizing of God. What we have here is the word of God.

That was confirmed all the way back in the first verse of this chapter where it says the word that Isaiah, the son of Amos, saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. This is a claim from Isaiah to be conveying the word of God, a word that he has received from the Lord, perhaps through a vision. He saw this word, not that he heard this word, but that he saw it. God revealed this to him perhaps in a vision. This is divine revelation, not human imagination or mere human theologizing. Now we noticed a number of Lord’s Days ago as we considered the earlier portion of this chapter that in verses two through four, we are given a prophecy of the Messianic New Covenant Age in which we are privileged to live. One of the things I pointed out on the last Lord’s Day is that in the book of the prophet Isaiah, there is a sort of a back and forth between passages that focus on the judgment of the Lord against sin and against the sins of his people and the nations that surrounded Israel.

Then there are passages that give comfort and hope, hope of restoration that the Lord will bring about through the promised Messiah, whom we know to be Jesus of course. Well in our passage for today in verses six through 22, we have once again a judgment oracle and an oracle that continues on into the following chapter. And this judgment oracle is ultimately fulfilled on the final judgment day. Isaiah envisions the final day of judgment when all that is proud and lofty will be brought low and when the Lord alone, Yahweh alone, will be exalted on that final day. Although that final day of judgment was anticipated by the many historic judgments that God brought against his sinful people and against the nations. An example of that of course is the Babylonian exile, which was to happen after this passage was recorded.

And that could be viewed as a proximate or near term fulfillment of passages like this one. But even those historic judgments such as the Babylonian exile and the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem in 70 AD, those historic judgments that the word of God predicted were ultimately anticipations of a final ultimate judgment. Those proximate historic judgments were anticipations of, foreshadowings of, pointers to the ultimate judgment day, the final day of judgment. And as we compare scripture with scripture we know that that final day of judgment will come upon us when our Lord Jesus Christ returns in visible glory at the end of this present age and raises the dead and then presides over the great white throne judgment and ultimately brings in the new heavens and the new earth wherein righteousness dwells. Now what can we learn from this passage?

There’s many things. We could spend weeks in this passage, but I want to focus on just a number of important lessons we glean from God’s word. First of all, consider the absolute certainty of the judgment day. This passage makes very clear that a judgment day is coming. And did you notice as I read through this chapter notice the tone of certainty that pervades and pulsates throughout this passage? Now let’s focus especially right now on verses 11 through 18. The last day we focused especially on verses 6 through 11, but let’s pick it up in verse 11 and consider this and through verse 18. Verse 11 it says, The haughty looks of man shall be brought low and the lofty pride of men shall be humbled and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day.

Now this is repeated almost word for word in verse 17 for emphasis as it says in verse 17. And the haughtiness of man shall be humbled and the lofty pride of men shall be brought low and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day. You know sometimes when we are instructing or disciplining our children we feel the need to repeat ourselves for emphasis. Well when God says something once it’s authoritative, it’s absolutely true, we can bank on it. But when God repeats himself in his word he really wants us to take note. That’s why Jesus was often fond of saying verily, verily, amen, amen or truly, truly I say to you. In other words listen up, this is important. We have repetition here because this underscores, this repetition helps to underscore the certainty of a final judgment day.

And on that final judgment day as we’ve considered on the last Lord’s day, on that final judgment day a great reversal will take place. The proud sinful man who exalts himself above the Lord, who regards the Lord’s name as low, instead of hallowing God’s name blasphemes the name of the Lord or cynically looks down upon those who identify as believers in the Lord. On that final day proud sinful man will be humbled and abased to the dust. The picture here is of an absolute humiliation, an absolute humbling of proud lofty man into the dust. But Yahweh alone will be exalted in that day. Not the Lord plus his faithful servants. The Lord alone will be exalted. Those of us who by sovereign grace have been redeemed and are rewarded not because we deserve it or merited it but rewarded by grace and given crowns.

What will we do? We say Lord I deserve this. No we’ll cast it out of the dust. We will cast our crowns before him and we will give him all the glory. The Lord alone will be exalted on that day and on that day the first shall be last, the last shall be first. God alone will be exalted and rebellious mankind will finally and forever be humbled before him. And then verses 12 through 16 section of this chapter in these verses various exalted objects in the natural world and the human world are apparently used here as symbols of proud and lofty things that shall be brought low and ultimately symbols of man’s pride that shall be humbled. And so it says in verse 12 for the Lord of hosts has a day against all that is proud and lofty, against all that is lifted up and it shall be brought low.

And what are some of the things that are mentioned here by Isaiah as illustrations of things that are lofty and high? Well look at verse 13. Against all the cedars of Lebanon, lofty and lifted up, these great cedars of Lebanon, lofty and lifted up and against all the oaks of Bashan. We might think in our own American context of those great redwood trees in California for example. I think that’s what they’re called right? Those huge trees that seem so permanent, so lofty, so high, so stable. And then verse 14 against all the lofty mountains, against all the uplifted hills. There were many mountains and hills in that and there are many mountains and hills in that region of the world. Against every high tower and against every fortified wall. You think of something like the Great Wall of China.

Mankind in its ingenuity has throughout its history erected huge walls of protection against foreign enemies. But even those high towers and every fortified wall will be brought low. Verse 16 against all the ships of Tarshish and against all the beautiful craft. These were incredible sea worthy vessels that had been created and that were used for trade in those days. And then verse 17 again, again, and the haughtiness of man and the lofty pride of men shall be brought low and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day. And what are we to make of all these illustrations? These cedars and oaks of Bashan and these high mountains and these fortified walls and high towers and beautiful ships of Tarshish and so forth. Well these are things that mankind tends to view as lofty and exalted.

I think Robin is correct that the prophet, meaning the prophet Isaiah declares that he had his eye on men when he described the various kinds of loftiness. For God is not displeased with the steep mountains or tall cedars which he created but informs us that the whole evil lies in men who vainly trust what is high and lofty. That’s the point. We look to things that seem to us to be high and lofty and we trust in our own selves as well as high and lofty. But the Lord will humble those who remain in their pride and rebellion against him. Again, verses 17 and 18 highlight the great reversal. And what will the result of that great reversal be? Well look at verse 18. When Isaiah was inspired by God to write this passage, the land of Israel and of course the lands of Israel’s neighbors were saturated with idolatry, filled with idols, filled with the worship of multiple deities, multiple false gods.

But the Lord is saying there will come a day when all the idols shall utterly pass away. There will be no more idolatry. There will be no more false worship or false religion on the day of judgment. Dear ones, our beloved Westminster Confession of Faith in the very last section of the very last chapter, chapter 33 of the Last Judgment, section 3, says the following. It says, as Christ would have us to be certainly persuaded that there shall be a day of judgment and we can be certainly persuaded because it is a certainty as we see from our passage. As Christ would have us to be certainly persuaded that there shall be a day of judgment both to deter all men from sin and for the greater consolation of the godly in their adversity, so will he have that day unknown to men that they may shake off all carnal security and be always watchful because they know not at what hour the Lord will come and may be ever prepared to say, Come, Lord Jesus, come quickly.

Amen. Dear listener, even though we do not know the date of our Lord’s return, Jesus made it clear, no man knows the day or the hour. And by the way, as an aside, if you ever come across someone who claims to know when Jesus is going to return, they’re lying or they’re deceived because no man knows the day or the hour. You cannot predict it. But nevertheless, it is an absolute certainty that that day is coming. And every day that passes is a day closer to the day when Jesus our Lord will return in glory and judge humanity. Are you, dear listener, ready for that day? For it will come upon you and me and all of humanity. And so we see the absolute certainty of the judgment day revealed in this passage. We also notice this passage highlighting the inescapable terror of the wicked that is coming on judgment day.

This is the second point on your outline. The inescapable terror of the Lord against the wicked that is coming on the judgment day. We see this, for example, in verse 10 where it says, Enter into the rock and hide in the dust from before the terror of the Lord and from the splendor of his majesty. Isaiah here under the Spirit’s inspiration is envisioning a time when there will be a manifestation of the splendor of the Lord’s holy majesty coming against the wicked in judgment. And what is the response? Isaiah says, Enter into the rock. You better run. You better seek refuge. But of course there is no ultimate escape from that terror of the Lord. For as you go down to verse 19 and following it says this, And people shall enter the caves of the rocks and the holes of the ground from before what?

From before the terror of Yahweh, the terror of the Lord, and from the splendor of his majesty when he rises to terrify the earth. Or consider verse 20 and 21. In that day, mankind will cast away their idols of silver and their idols of gold, valuable though they may be. They will cast away their idols of silver, their idols of gold, which they have made for themselves to worship to the moles and to the bats. To do what? Verse 21. To enter the caverns of the rocks and the cliffs from before the terror of the Lord and from the splendor of his majesty when he does what? When he rises to terrify the earth. When he rises in holy judgment against all that has been unrepentant and rebellious. So, we have in this passage a picture of the wicked desperately seeking to escape from the revelation of the majestic holiness of their infinitely holy Lord and Judge.

Desperately seeking a refuge from the holy wrath of God, but it is all in vain. Apart from Jesus Christ, there is no refuge from the wrath of God against sin. This sort of reminds me of Adam and Eve. Remember, back in the day, they would eat the forbidden fruit, and they were suddenly aware of their nakedness, which pointed to not just their physical nakedness, but their physical nakedness, and they tried to sew fig leaves together. By their own efforts, they tried to cover up that nakedness, which is a picture of false religion and idolatry. But then what do they hear? They hear the sound of the Lord coming, often it is translated, in the cool of the day. But some biblical scholars, like I believe Dr. Meredith Klein, say that the better translation is likely the Lord was coming, not in the cool of the days, this sort of idyllic picturesque language, but no, he came in the spirit of the day.

In other words, after Adam and Eve fell, they hear the sound of the Lord coming in the spirit of the judgment day. No wonder they run and seek to hide from the Lord, because they know judgment is coming. The Lord is going to confront them with their sin and rebellion. And we get that similar picture here of the unrepentant wicked seeking refuge from the Lord. Seeking refuge where? In the caves and the caverns. You know, the land of Judah was, and I believe still is, quite mountainous. And it offered many caves, many caverns, and fissures in the rock walls of the terrain where the people could find suitable hiding places from their military enemies. Remember King David, before he was king, when he was fleeing for his life from King Saul, who was trying to kill him?

David became very skilled in finding hiding places in the land. Fissures in the rock and caves and caverns where he could hide from his pursuers. The land of Judah offered many such fissures and caves and caverns to escape from military enemies. But friends, the point here is that on that final judgment day, not even the mountains and caves and fissures throughout the land of Judah or anywhere else for that matter, will be suitable or sufficient to shield the unrepentant wicked from the holy wrath of the Lord’s majestic holiness. We know in our heart of hearts that we are sinners. We know the glory of God. And our natural fallen sinful impulse is to run away from God, to flee from God because we know, we know that the terror, the judging terror of the Lord is coming upon us.

But friends, there is a refuge from the wrath of the Lord in our hearts. Dr. E.J. Young in his commentary makes a very profound statement. Here are these words. He writes, the only way to run from God is to run to him. The only way to run from God, the only way to flee from God’s holy and righteous wrath against your sin is to run to him, to run to the grace and mercy that he offers to sinners in the person and saving work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Friends, the Lord Jesus Christ is the one and only safe refuge from the holy wrath of God. He only is our rock, our refuge. He is our shield and our strength. He is our high tower. May you find your refuge in him. Have you found refuge from the wrath of God against your sin through trusting in the person of Jesus Christ who was crucified for the forgiveness of sins and raised from the dead so that by sovereign grace whoever believes in him may not perish but have everlasting life.

His arms are wide open to sinners who see their need for a refuge from the holy wrath to come. For Jesus took that wrath upon himself. Jesus made himself the object of the divine arrows of God’s holy wrath. In fact, God out of love sent his son to pay the penalty for sin to save his people from their sins. It’s not that Jesus died to make an angry God loving, though God is angry with our sin, angry against sinners, but God out of love sent Jesus to satisfy the demands of his own holy wrath. Jesus endured the terror of the Lord on the cross of Calvary as he bore in his own body and his own soul the holy wrath of the Father against our sin. He did that in our place, in our stead, brothers and sisters.

And he is our rock. He is our refuge. Is he your rock? Your refuge. The final thing I would point out briefly from this passage, beloved, we see here in this passage the worthless futility of false religion in shielding sinners from the divine wrath. The worthless futility of false religion in shielding sinners from the divine wrath. Says in verse 20, in that day mankind will cast away their idols of silver and their idols of gold. Now think about that. These are not idols of bronze. These are not idols of worthless material. These are valuable things, valuable objects. These idolaters treasured their idols, for their idols were of silver and gold, highly valued by them. But on that day of judgment, what will happen to those idols of silver and gold, which they made for themselves to worship?

They worshiped the objects of their own hands. Where would they cast these idols of silver and gold? To the moles and to the bats. Into the dark places of the earth where only moles and bats would dwell. Unclean creatures. In other words, the valuable idols of silver and gold, so treasured by their worshippers, will be cast aside in haste and shame and utter contempt as worthless on that final day. For those who trusted in them, instead of trusting in the Lord, will find their idols to be useless to deliver them from Yahweh’s majestic avenging presence on the judgment day. And instead, it says, they will do so. They’ll cast aside their idols. Instead of turning to their idols and saying, save me, oh God, oh my idol, they’ll cast them aside to enter the caverns of the rocks and the clefts of the hills from before the terror of the Lord and from the splendor of His majesty when He rises to terrify the earth.

But of course, there will be no real escape. Escape will then be futile. Because when Jesus returns and when the judgment day is upon us, the day of grace will have vanished away. The word of God says that today is the day of salvation. We live in the time between the times. We live in this time, this period of redemptive history, where our Lord has come and He has died for our sins and risen from the dead. He reigns at the Father’s right hand. He intercedes. And He is through the church and through the preaching of the gospel, He is proclaiming good news to the nations and He is extending that olive branch to all who by sovereign grace would come to Him in true faith and repentance. And He is calling through the gospel to the world.

He is summoning the earth to repent and believe. This is a day of grace for those who will believe. But it’s not a day that will last forever. Today is the day of salvation. Therefore, do not put off until tomorrow what God in sovereign grace brings to you in the gospel. May God in His sovereign grace not only call you externally, but call you effectually by His Spirit to personally receive and rest upon Christ and Christ alone for your salvation. And the Bible says that if you believe, if you trust, you will be saved. What is the conclusion? The conclusion is here in verse 22. Stop regarding man in whose nostrils is breath, for of what account is he? To trust in idols, to trust in false religion, to trust in false faith, especially works-based religion, is to trust in man.

And false man-made religions are the result of the imagination and works of man’s hands. But they are worthless to save your soul. So turn, dear listener, let us all, and Calvin was right, the human heart, and this is true of believers as well. We still are guilty of idolatry, even as believers. Our hearts are factories of idols. Calvin was right in declaring. And the Bible says the heart is deceitful above measure and desperately wicked, including the heart of the regenerate, because we still have that sin nature in us, though it is pardoned and mortified in Christ. So let us, brothers and sisters, let us continually forsake and turn from our idols, whatever form those idols may take. And instead, let us flee from the wrath to come by fleeing into the arms of the Lord Jesus Christ, whose arms are open wide, who says, come to me all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Let us flee to him and turn from idols. And praise God that Jesus Christ, that he is an all-sufficient refuge, that we are free from the terror of the Lord. Amen. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we do thank you and praise you for Jesus, our glorious Lord and Savior, and for his finished work. And we would pray, Lord, that we would indeed hate the idols that continue to grip our souls, that we would forsake them, mortify them, put them to death. And by your grace, may we once again fix our eyes upon Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, and may we follow after him, trusting him and him alone. We pray these things, Heavenly Father, in Jesus’ name, and all of God’s people said, Amen. Dear friends, let’s rise and sing together, number 286, Let Us Love and Sing and Wonder, 286.

The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.

July 14, 2024
Yahweh Exalted, Mankind Humbled

About this sermon

Isaiah says the Lord has rejected the house of Jacob, because the land is full of eastern superstition, fortune tellers, wealth, horses, and idols, the work of their own hands. Proud humanity bows down to dead idols, so God will humble them. “The haughty looks of man shall be brought low, and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day.” The day of the Lord comes against all that is proud and lofty. God calls believers to stop trusting in man and to fear the Lord.

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Sermon transcript

Dear friends, please remain standing for the reading of God’s Word as we continue our consideration of Isaiah, the book of the prophet Isaiah. The title of my sermon series is Gleanings in Isaiah. We’re going to go through various passages in the book of Isaiah, and today we are in Isaiah chapter 2. I’m going to read, starting at verse 5, although the sermon text is verse 6 through 22, I’m going to begin reading in verse 5, especially today on verses 6 through 11. Isaiah chapter 2, beginning at verse 5 and reading to the end of the chapter, you’ll find that reading beginning on page 674 in your pew Bible. Dear friends, this is the word of God. Hear it with reverence and awe. O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord.

For you have rejected your people, the house of Jacob, because they are full of things from the east and of fortune tellers like the Philistines, and they strike hands with the children of foreigners. Their land is filled with silver and gold, and there is no end to their treasures. Their land is filled with horses, and there is no end to their chariots. Their land is filled with idols. They bow down to the work of their hands, to what their own fingers have made. So man is humbled, and each one is brought low. Do not forgive them. Enter into the rock and hide in the dust from before the terror of the Lord, and from the splendor of his majesty. The haughty looks of man shall be brought low, and the lofty pride of men shall be humbled, and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day.

For the Lord of hosts has a day against all that is proud and lofty, against all that is lifted up, and it shall be brought low, against all the cedars of Lebanon lofty and lifted up, and against all the oaks of Bashan, and against all the lofty mountains, and against all the uplifted hills, against every high tower, and against every fortified wall, against all the ships of Tarshish, and against all the beautiful craft. And the haughtiness of man shall be humbled, and the lofty pride of men shall be brought low, and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day. And the idols shall utterly pass away, and people shall enter the caves of the rocks, and the holes of the ground from before the terror of the Lord, and from the splendor when he rises to terrify the earth.

In that day mankind will cast away their idols of silver, and their idols of gold, which they made for themselves to worship, to the moles, and to the bats, to enter the caverns of the rocks, and the clefts of the cliffs from before the terror of the Lord, and from the splendor of his majesty when he rises to terrify the earth. Up regarding man in whose nostrils is breath, for of what account is he? The grass withers, and the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever. Once again let’s seek the Lord’s blessing upon the preaching of his word. Heavenly Father, we do thank you that you have raised up prophets and apostles to convey your infallible word to us, and we thank you Lord for the prophet Isaiah. We thank you for this portion of your holy word, and we ask that by your holy spirit you would illuminate our minds and open our hearts to behold wondrous things from your word this day.

Cause your word to find a lodging place in our souls, and by the supernatural power of your spirit cause your word to bear spiritual fruit in our lives unto salvation and sanctification. And be glorified this day Lord, Jesus be present in the proclamation of your word by your spirit this day. In your name we pray, and all of God’s people said, Amen. You may be seated. The title of my sermon today is Yahweh Exalted Mankind Humbled. And that word Yahweh, that is the covenant name for God, in your English translations when the translators use the word Lord, and it’s in all capital letters, that’s an indication to the English reader that the translators are translating this Hebrew word Yahweh, sometimes it’s transliterated as Jehovah, and that is the covenant name for God, and it refers to God as our gracious covenant redeemer.

So again the title of my sermon is Yahweh Exalted Mankind Humbled, and if you’re following along in your sermon outline you’ll notice the children, I’d like to point out to the number of key words that you can be listening for in my sermon today. Well dear ones, one of the biggest challenges for pastors and sessions when it comes to their responsibility in spiritually shepherding God’s people is to discern when it is appropriate to offer comfort and encouragement on the one hand, and when it becomes necessary to confront and rebuke on the other hand. Jesus himself, the good shepherd of God’s elect sheep, Jesus of course did this with perfect wisdom and perfect discernment. If you’re familiar with the Gospel accounts you will notice that Jesus does not address everyone in exactly the same way. Jesus rather tailors his words to his audience and to their spiritual needs as well as their spiritual state.

And so for example, let me ask you, how did our Lord speak to that broken, humbled, sinful woman who wet his feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair? How did Jesus address her? Did he speak harsh words of rebuke to her? Did he denounce her for her sins which were many? The answer of course is no. He spoke to her words of comfort and assurance because he saw not only her heart, he saw in her behavior that she was broken and crushed and humbled over her sin. So he spoke Gospel words to her, words of forgiveness and encouragement. And likewise, think about the gracious and hopeful words that our Lord spoke to that rich but repentant tax collector, Zacchaeus. You remember little Zacchaeus who climbed the sycamore tree? How did Jesus speak to Zacchaeus when Zacchaeus indicated not only that he was seeking to see the Lord but that he was repentant and was willing to bear the fruits of repentance in making restitution for those whom he had cheated?

Consider our Lord’s word to Zacchaeus in Luke chapter 19 verses 8 through 10. Let me just read that passage very quickly to you. Luke 19 verses 8 through 10 says, And Zacchaeus stood and said to the Lord, Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor. And if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I restore it fourfold. And Jesus said to him, Today salvation has come to this house, since he also is a son of Abraham, for the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost. Oh, what precious Gospel words he speaks to repentant Zacchaeus. But on the other hand, consider the sharp and confrontational language of judgment and rebuke that our Lord spoke to the hypocritical, self-righteous religious leaders, those leaders who opposed him and who rejected his messianic authority.

There are many examples of these words of confrontation and rebuke coming from the lips of our Lord Jesus throughout the Gospel accounts. But let me just read a brief passage, Matthew 23 verses 25 through 28 to give you a sampling of these kinds of words that Jesus spoke to his contemporaries. Matthew 23, 25 through 28, Jesus says this, Woe to you, that term woe is a term indicating a curse, woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you tithe mint and dill and cumin and have neglected the weightier matters of the law, justice and mercy and faithfulness. These things you ought to have done without neglecting the others. You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel, woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you clean the outside of the cup and the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence.

You get the picture, don’t you? Friends like the church’s Lord, the churches under shepherds, the pastors and elders of the church are to exercise wisdom and discernment in giving appropriate counsel and speaking appropriate words that are tailored to the various circumstances of God’s people. And so for example, it would be inappropriate for a pastor or a session to speak sharp words of rebuke to a broken, repentant church member who confesses his struggles in overcoming a besetting sin. On the contrary, under such circumstances, the member in question would need gospel comfort and encouragement. But on the other hand, it would be equally inappropriate for a pastor or session to offer words of comfort and assurance to church members who have proven themselves over time to be spiritually insensitive, unteachable, arrogant, resistant to authority, contumacious and backslidden or hardened in their sin, especially if such sin is of a publicly scandalous nature.

In such circumstances, confrontation and sharp rebuke will likely become necessary. Now at this point, I’m sure you’re probably thinking, okay, Pastor Jeff, I get it. But aren’t we here in Isaiah today? What does that, what does all of this have to do with our passage for this Lord’s Day morning from the book of the prophet Isaiah? Well, the reason I bring this up is to connect us with the kind of, the kind of language that we find throughout the book of the prophet Isaiah. The reason I bring this up is because if you are a careful student of the book of Isaiah, you’ll notice that Isaiah’s prophecies alternate between on the one hand, oracles of judgment and doom, which involve the use of sharp and at times even harsh and shocking language. But on the other hand, Isaiah’s prophecy also includes numerous oracles of hope and comfort and restoration.

And it depends upon his audience. It depends upon who he is speaking to, who the spirit is inspiring him to speak to. And so for example, even in this very chapter, chapter two, we see that alternation taking place in the previous passage, the text that immediately leads up to our passage for today in the first five verses of Isaiah chapter two, we find a prophecy about the glories of the new covenant messianic era and therefore a revelation from God that is intended to bring great comfort and hope and assurance to the faithful and repentant among God’s professed covenant people. But friends, if you were listening carefully, you will notice that in our passage for this Lord’s Day morning, starting at verse six and going through the end, not only through the end of this chapter, but into the following chapters as well, you will notice that this morning begins a lengthy judgment section of Isaiah, a judgment section in which Yahweh, Israel’s faithful covenant-making, covenant-keeping God and sovereign Lord, Yahweh confronts the proud idolaters and the unrepentant, worldly-minded hypocrites within the ranks of his professed covenant people at that time.

And he confronts them with harsh words of doom and divine judgment. Just as the Lord has spoken words of comfort and hope that were intended to be encouraging to the humble, repentant, and believing among his people, so friends, in this passage he assures the haughty and the arrogant among his professed people that there is coming a day when Yahweh, the true and living God, when Yahweh alone will be exalted and when wicked, idolatrous, proud, impenitent humanity, including the impenitent hypocrites among God’s professed people, will be utterly abased, utterly humiliated, utterly humbled to the dust. This morning our special focus will be on verses six through 11. And as we consider the first three verses of our passage for today, verses six through eight, I want you to notice the Lord’s rejection of his people. We learn here, shockingly and disturbingly, of the Lord’s rejection of his unfaithful people.

It says this beginning in verse six. Well let me just, let me again start at verse five. Verse five ends the opening section of chapter two, which is a section filled with hope and comfort pointing forward to the Messianic age. And then Isaiah writes, O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord. He addresses God’s professed people as the house of Jacob and he calls upon them to walk in the light of the Lord. In other words, to walk in true faith and the obedience that springs from that faith. But then in the very next verse, the beginning of this judgment section, we read these words, these shocking words. For you have rejected your people. Who are his people? Well the same people that were addressed in verse five, the house of Jacob.

You have rejected your people. Now for those of us who are reformed and Calvinistic in our understanding of salvation, passages like this can be a little bit troubling. Because we think to ourselves, how can we understand this passage? God doesn’t reject his elect, does he? I mean, how are we to understand this reference to God rejecting his people? After all, doesn’t it say in passages like Romans 11 verse two, doesn’t that passage say God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew? Well friends, that might seem like a contradiction, but it’s not an actual contradiction. You see, in passages like the one that we are considering this morning, where it tells us that Yahweh has rejected his people, the house of Jacob, it’s important for us to understand that there is a distinction between the people of God considered as a visible community on the one hand, and the true people of God, meaning the elect who demonstrate their election by exercising true faith in Christ and repentance unto life.

In other words, it’s important for us to understand that there is a distinction between covenants, at least broadly considered, and election. Now the two concepts and the two principles, these two truths are closely connected in scripture, but they can be distinguished. And so friends, in the Romans 11-2 passage, that passage is talking about God’s elect people. Those whom he foreknew in his everlasting, sovereign, predestinating love, whereas in our passage for today, this passage is speaking of the visible covenant people of God. When Isaiah says of the Lord, when he says to the Lord, for you have rejected your people, this means not all of those who are identified as his people, for God has always preserved for himself an elect remnant in sovereign grace. And rather, he is speaking, he means the visible covenant community, the visible church of that time.

It is speaking here of the people on the whole, for the people as a whole at that particular point in redemptive history, they had refused to fear and trust the Lord. They had refused to walk in the way of his covenant. This was evidenced by their idolatry and syncretism, as well as their worldly-mindedness. And so this passage and passages like it remind us that it is possible to be in the covenant externally. It is possible to be in the covenant externally, but not in the covenant in a saving sense. People who possess true saving faith will indeed profess that faith, but not everyone who professes faith in Christ actually possesses that faith. And so it is from passages like this one that we derive the distinction between the invisible church and the visible church. The invisible church does not mean the church of the saints who have departed into heaven or it is not the church of ghosts, it is rather referring to the church as God sees it, whereas the visible church refers to the church as man sees it.

And so here, again, the Lord through Isaiah is addressing the visible church, the church as man sees it. And it says, you have rejected your people, the church in this sense. Well, why has God rejected his people? What is the basis for it? Well, it is explained in this passage. The Holy Spirit explains it in this passage. You have rejected your people, the house of Jacob, why? Because they are full of things from the east and of fortune tellers like the Philistines. The Philistines were the coastal peoples. They were the Gentiles who lived on the western coast by the Mediterranean. And so basically what this is saying is that the people of God at that particular time, instead of being a light to the nations around them, instead of shining the light of God’s revelation, instead of spreading the knowledge of the true and living God to the Gentile nations that surrounded them, instead of being a witness and light for the truth of God’s word and the truth of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, instead of that, they had adopted the practices of the nations around them.

Instead of leavening the nations around them with the leaven of God’s holy law and holy truth, they were leavened with the leaven of wickedness, sin, and idolatry as adopted from the nations. This is basically getting at the fact that the people had been guilty of covenant breaking. They had been guilty of covenant breaking through such things as occultism and participation in pagan idolatry, basically syncretism. Syncretism is when you combine the true faith, the revealed faith given to us in the word of God with false religion and false theology and false worship. God had been very clear to his people that they were not to do this. They were not to consult fortune tellers, for example. Consider with me if you would. Let’s turn to Leviticus 19 verse 26, Leviticus chapter 19 verse 26. We read these words in that passage.

It says, You shall not eat any flesh and blood in it. That was one of the practices that set Israel apart from their pagan neighbors and pointed them to the fact that they needed blood atonement for the blood belonged to the Lord. Notice next what it says. You shall not do what? You shall not interpret omens or tell fortunes. God makes it very clear. You’re not to consult fortune tellers. You’re not to be engaged in occultic activities. This is brought out even more explicitly and clearly in Deuteronomy 18 verses 9 through 14. Let me just read those verses to you, friends. The Lord there says through Moses, When you come into the land that the Lord your God has given you, you shall not learn to follow the abominable practices of those nations. There shall not be found among you anyone who burns his son or his daughter as an offering.

That was a horrific, wicked practice of the Canaanites who lived in the land before the Israelites were sent by God to conquer the promised land. By the way, as an aside, the people who lived in Canaan at that time were a tremendously wicked, immoral, idolatrous people. So God used the Israelites to judge them, bring his holy judgment upon them. But God is saying you’re not to do as they did. There shall not be found among you anyone who burns his son or his daughter as an offering. Anyone who does what? Who practices divination or tells fortunes or interprets omens or a sorcerer or a charmer or a medium or a necromancer or one who inquires of the dead. For whoever does these things is what? Is an abomination to the Lord. You want to give yourself over to pagan cultic idolatry, to give yourself over to occultic practices, you make yourself an abomination unto the Lord.

God is very clear and very explicit. Whoever does these things is an abomination to the Lord. And because of these abominations, the Lord your God is driving them out before you. You shall be blameless before the Lord your God. For these nations which you are about to dispossess, listen to fortune tellers and to diviners. But as for you, the Lord your God has not allowed you to do this. Occultic activities involves seeking after secret knowledge, knowledge that isn’t accessible to your senses or accessible from the word of God. And it shows a lack of reverence for and trust in the Lord. When you consult astrology, when you consult Ouija boards, when you consult fortune tellers and so forth, when you engage in those practices, you’re basically saying, God your word isn’t enough, I need more knowledge, I need to know the future, I need to read my poems or tell my future.

It’s not a joke, it’s an abomination to God, my friends. And the people of God, those who claim to belong to Yahweh the Lord, those who claim to be his worshippers in the days of Isaiah were consulting fortune tellers. They were adopting the superstitions and the pagan practices of their pagan neighbors. It goes on to say they strike hands with the children of foreigners. We’re not exactly sure what this striking of the hands refers to, but it probably refers to some kind of pagan ritual or pagan practice. So friends, covenant breaking was the reason, the ultimate reason for their rejection by the Lord. And then it goes on to say in verse seven, their land is filled with silver and gold and there is no end to their treasures. Their land is filled with horses and there is no end to their chariots.

Is God saying that it’s wrong to have riches or wealth? Is God saying it’s wrong to have military strength as represented by horses and chariots? That doesn’t seem to be what the problem was. The problem was that they were apparently trusting in these things. Instead of trusting in the Lord, they were trusting in their riches. They were trusting in their military might. Instead of trusting in Yahweh, their faithful God. They had wealth. They had silver and gold. They had prosperity, as we see in the reference to their treasures. They also had military strength, horses and chariots. Today’s equivalence, of course, would be things like military resources such as guns and bazookas and missiles and bombs and drones and tanks and so forth. It’s not saying that it’s wrong in and of itself to have those things, but to multiply them and to trust in them.

The Lord had made it very clear to His people they were not to do so. But not only did they have these things, verse eight goes on to say, their land is filled with what? Their land is filled with idols. Idolatry is supremely blasphemous and offensive to God in whatever form that idolatry takes. And their land was filled at that time. Their land was filled with idols. He says, they bow down to the work of their hands, to what their own fingers have made. They were guilty of idolatry and of trusting in the works of their own hands. I want to point out here in verse eight, the Holy Spirit through Isaiah says their land is filled with idols. What land is that referring to? That’s referring to the promised land, the holy land, the land that God in His grace had given to them as a gift.

God remember, God had redeemed the children of Israel from their slavery in Egypt and He brought them through the Red Sea on dry land. He brought them through the wilderness, having given them His holy law, His Torah, His covenant instruction from Mount Sinai. And they went into the promised land and He gave them the land as a gift. And that land was intended to be a type, a picture, a foreshadowing of the ultimate promised land, the new heavens and the new earth wherein righteousness dwells. But that very land, that land that belonged to the Lord, Yahweh, in a special way, that land that was consecrated to the Lord and whose people were to be consecrated to the Lord, that land that was to be a picture of heaven had become darkened and saturated with pagan idolatry and with the works of their own hands.

There’s many lessons that we can learn from this opening passage here, but just a couple points of application before we move on. I’ve talked about how this passage addresses the visible church, the state of the visible church at that particular time in redemptive history, and that the Lord had rejected His people on the whole for their covenant breaking, their unfaithfulness. And this may tempt us to think that, well, if that’s the case, the visible church doesn’t really matter that much. I mean, as long as you belong to the Lord, you don’t really need to belong to the church. As long as we’re in the invisible church, then the visible church is not that important. But friends, that’s not the conclusion that we should derive from a passage like this. It is truly a great privilege to belong in membership to the visible church of Jesus Christ.

There are great spiritual advantages in being a member of the visible, organized church. The scriptures indicate that to be the case. Indeed, friends, Christ has entrusted His means of grace, especially the Word and the sacraments, to His visible church. Christ has not entrusted the means of grace to parachurch organizations. There are many fine Christian parachurch organizations. We prayed for the Roabahs this morning. They worked for Wycliffe Bible translators, and that wonderful organization helps to support the work of the church in translating and disseminating the Word of God to the nations. That’s a good thing. But Christ has entrusted the preaching of His Word and the administration of the sacraments to His visible church. But friends, it is possible to be a member of the visible church without being a member of Christ. Only by the sovereign grace of God and through the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit and by personal faith, personal trust in Christ as your very own Lord and Savior can you belong to Christ.

Do you belong to Christ? Is He your Lord and Savior? Have you trusted Him? Christ, the Son of God incarnate, came to this earth to pay the penalty for sin. He died on the cross for sinners. We’re told in Romans 5 verse 8 that God demonstrates His love for us in this, that while we were yet sinners, rebels against God, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. He paid the penalty for sin. And He rose from the dead three days later, proving that the Father has accepted His sacrifice. And we’re told in passages like John 3, 16, for God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son that whoever believes in Him might not perish but have everlasting life. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Trust in Him and Him alone for your salvation.

And then you can be assured that not only do you have membership in the visible people You are a member of Christ, clothed in His righteousness, forgiven through His blood, renewed by His Spirit, and sealed by that Spirit unto the day of eternity for life everlasting. So this is something that I would encourage us to consider. The visible church is important, but make sure that you’re trusting in Christ by the grace of God. We also learn in this passage that idolatry is supremely offensive to God. And idolatry can take many forms. Of course, in the ancient world that Isaiah is addressing, idolatry was typically in the form of crass idolatry. People bowing down to statues of gold, blocks of wood, literally the works of men’s hands. But today, though we are in a very secular society, we are equally, if not more so, idolatrous in comparison to the ancient Israelites.

It’s just that our idolatry is much more subtle. You see, whatever is the most important thing to you, that is in practice your actual God. You may claim to be a believer in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the true and living God, but as John Calvin rightly put it, the human heart, our sinful fallen human heart is a factory of idolatry. Our hearts are always cranking out new idols to bow down to. And that idolatry can take many forms. It might take the form of your career. If your career is the most important thing to you, that in practice is your actual God. Relationships, even good relationships, if they become more important to you than your relationship to Christ, that is an idol. And today, it seems to me today, the biggest idol of all is the idol of self, self-identity, creating your own reality.

There’s this idea out there that, hey, you’re your own person. You can create your own reality. Do your own thing. This idolatry especially comes out when it comes to the area of sexual ethics. If you’re consenting, it’s fine. No problem. That’s not what the word of God says. If it is not within the context of marriage, it is forbidden. God knows what he’s saying. He knows what is right. There are many, many idols. What are the idols of your heart? I have idols that I wrestle with in my heart, and so do you. By the grace of God, let us flee idolatry and let us plant ourselves at the foot of the cross and look to Christ and Christ alone for our salvation from all sin, including the sin of the idols of our hearts.

We also learn in this passage that we must not mess with the occult. Let us not seek the forbidden knowledge that the occult promises. Let us instead search the scriptures. Let us know the word of God. We’ve considered that the Lord has rejected his people, but next let us consider briefly the abasement of proud humanity. How is the Lord manifesting this rejection of his proud, impenitent people who refuse to repent? Well, he promises to humble them, to abase them. Look at verse 8. It says, the land is filled with idols. They bow down to the work of their hands. Now let’s pause there. Do you see how irrational, really, how stupid this is? Idolatry is both irrational and it is dehumanizing and degrading. Idolatry leads an otherwise rational man, an image bearer of God, the creator, to bow down to the work of his own hands.

How irrational to bow down before something that you yourself have made and to trust in that thing that you have made or to bow down to something that has been made by the imagination and skill of sinful man. And how degrading for an image bearer of God to bow down in worship before and to trust in not the true and living God who created him, but before an idol that has been created for him by either himself or another human being. It’s degrading. It’s irrational. And then verse 9, it goes on to say, so man is humbled and each one is brought low, do not forgive them. Now the New King James Version and translations like it read, people bow down and each man humbles himself. What’s this referring to? In the context of this passage, it’s possible here in verse 9 that the humbling or being brought low would seem to be referring to the way that idolaters grovel and humble themselves before the objects of their worship, namely the dead idols that they reverence.

But this could simply also be referring to the effects of idolatry. Idolaters in their pride, they humble themselves, they bow down before worthless dead idols, so God will humble them and bow them down, in other words. But however we are to understand what this is saying, again, this seems to highlight the degrading and dehumanizing effects of idolatry. As they persist unrepentant in degrading and humbling themselves before their idols, Isaiah cries out, do not forgive them. Now this may seem harsh. Isaiah is not saying here, the Holy Spirit is not saying through Isaiah that there’s no forgiveness for the repentant idolater. Not at all. Many of God’s people, no doubt, had heard the message of Isaiah and by the grace of God had repented and received pardon. But Isaiah here has in mind those who are hardened and settled in their sins, those who have dug in their heels, if you will, in pursuing their idolatrous ways.

And he says, do not forgive them. We’re told in scripture that while our Lord is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and covenant faithfulness, nevertheless, God says of himself that he will by no means clear the guilty. So this is a warning here. And what will be the result? Well, look at verse 10. Enter into the rock and hide in the dust. The terrain of that area of the world boasts many caves, many rocks that you could seek to take refuge in. And the picture here is that the terror of the Lord, the wrath and majesty of the Lord is coming to enter into judgment with sinful mankind. And it is such a distressing event that people seek to escape the majestic presence of God. And they seek to hide from the Lord.

They enter into the rock. They seek to hide themselves in the dust. This too speaks to the abasement and terror of the divine judgment. But it also tells us that there will be no escape for those who persist in their proud rebellion against the Lord. Well, what are we to do with all of this? Well, friends, in James chapter 4 verse 6, where James is quoting from Proverbs 3 verse 34, it says, God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. The humble being those who by sovereign grace have come to recognize their sin, to feel their depravity and their need for a savior. God opposes the proud, the self-righteous. Those who rest in themselves or their own works, their own accomplishments for salvation. He opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.

How then should we respond to this prophecy of judgment against the proud? Well, by the grace of God, may we humble ourselves in the sight of the Lord. Let me read what James writes in James chapter 4, 7 through 10. Says this, submit yourselves therefore to God, resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord and here’s the promise, and he will exalt you. By the grace of God, may we humble ourselves before the Lord, trusting that he in Christ will exalt us. And that brings me to my final brief point based on verse 11.

We see here in this passage the exaltation of Yahweh on the day of the Lord. Those who humble themselves will be exalted and we will be exalted in the Lord because the Lord himself and the Lord alone will be exalted on that day of the Lord. Look at verse 11, God says the haughty looks of man shall be brought low. The haughty, proud looks of man will be brought low. And the lofty pride of men shall be humbled. And the Lord alone will be exalted in that day. What is that day? Well ultimately as we will see as we continue to work our way through this passage in future, this is referring to that final eschatological day of the Lord, the final judgment day at the end of history when the Lord will pour out his consummate wrath upon the wicked reprobate but will bring his saved ones to the final consummation and blessing of their eternal salvation.

On that final day, the first shall indeed be last and the last shall be first. All wrongs will be brought to rights. The pride of wicked idolatrous men will be ultimately abased and humbled. The redeemed children of God will be openly acknowledged and vindicated. And the Lord alone will be exalted in that day. Soli Deo Gloria to God alone be the glory. Now friends throughout redemptive history there were many lesser days of the Lord. There were many historical judgment events that were predicted by the prophets and which pointed forward to that final day of judgment. Events such as the fall and exile of Israel to the Assyrians and the fall and exile of Judah to the Babylonians and so forth. These historical judgment events can be regarded as proximate and initial fulfillments of prophecies like this one.

But they all pointed forward to that greater ultimate day of the Lord. There is a final day of the Lord coming and that is the day when Jesus the Messiah the Son of God will return in glory. Dear listeners may God in his sovereign grace grant that we may be ready to welcome that day. May we humble ourselves in the sight of the Lord resting in Christ and Christ’s righteousness alone for only in him will we stand on that day. And he alone will be exalted on that day and the proud will be abased. But in the meantime may the Lord see fit to be glorified in our lives and in his church and may we all seek to fulfill our chief end and what is our chief end brothers and sisters? Our chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever.

May God make it so amen. Gracious Heavenly Father we thank you and that you are holy that you are just that you are righteous. We know Lord that you will indeed abase the proud among mankind. But we thank you Lord that you give grace to the humble. We ask that we might be humbled by your grace that we may know your forgiveness and exaltation. Grant us the grace to trust in Christ and Christ alone and to walk in union with him in our day to day lives. And we pray Heavenly Father that we would walk in the confidence of knowing that as you’ve promised in your word that there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus and that you have sealed us in Christ by your spirit unto the day of redemption.

We ask Lord that we would live day by day in covenant union and communion with our Savior and in great confidence knowing that we need not fear that final day but that we may welcome it because we will be welcomed at that time to our final home. In Jesus name we pray and all of us amen. Let’s respond to what we’ve heard by rising and we’ll sing as our closing hymn number 387 day of judgment day of wonders 387.

The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.

July 7, 2024
Zion’s Exaltation in the Latter Days

About this sermon

Isaiah foresees the latter days, when the Lord will raise the mountain of his house above all mountains and the nations will stream to it to learn his ways. The nations will beat their swords into plowshares. The New Testament says we are in those last days, the last hour between Christ’s comings. Christ brings Jew and Gentile together into one people of God, and the peace of the messianic age has begun. The moral call follows: “O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord.”

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Sermon transcript

Well, please remain standing for the reading of God’s Word. My sermon text this morning is Isaiah chapter 2 verses 1 through 5. You’ll find that beginning on page 673 in your Pew Bibles as we continue our study of the book of the prophet Isaiah. We come to this passage this morning. Isaiah chapter 2 verses 1 through 5. Dear friends, this is the Word of God. Let us hear it with reverence and awe. The Word that Isaiah the son of Amos saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem, it shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be lifted up above the hills, and all the nations shall flow to it. And many peoples shall come and say, Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways, and that we may walk in his paths.

For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He shall judge between the nations, and shall decide disputes for many peoples. And they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore. O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord. The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever. Let’s pray for the Lord to bless the proclamation of his word. O dearest Lord and Father in heaven, we thank you that you have spoken to us in the scriptures, for the Bible is your God-breathed infallible word. It is a lamp unto our feet, a light into our path. We would ask heavenly Father that by your spirit you would give us wisdom and insight as we consider this portion of your inerrant scriptures.

We pray, heavenly Father, that you would open our minds and our hearts to behold wondrous things from your word. We pray that your word would find a lodging place in our souls and bear much spiritual fruit in our lives. We would ask, Lord, once again, that you would set a guard over my lips, that I might speak only that which is faithful to your word, glorifying to your name and edifying to your people. We pray these things, O Lord, in Jesus’ name and all of God’s people said. Amen. You may be seated. The title of my sermon this morning is Zion’s exaltation in the latter days, and if you’re following along in your sermon outline, you’ll notice there’s quite a few words that you can follow along with if it helps you to follow along with the sermon.

Well, dear ones, let me ask you a question. What time is it? Now, I’m not asking you, and if you looked at your watch, I tricked you. What time is it? Well, I’m not asking you to check your watches or your phones, though I may catch some of you doing that a bit later if this sermon happens to run a little long, but don’t worry, hopefully that won’t happen. What I mean by this question is what time is it, quote unquote, in the sense of where do we find ourselves living in terms of the flow of God’s plan of salvation, the flow of redemptive history? Dear ones, the biblical answer to that question is that in this present age, we find ourselves living in a period of redemptive history between our Lord’s first advent, which took place almost 2,000 years ago in Bethlehem, and his future glorious second advent, which will take place when Jesus comes back in glory at the end of this present age.

In our passage for this Lord’s Day morning, the prophet Isaiah writes about this present period of redemptive history in which we find ourselves living today in this new covenant era, in this age between the ages, this period of time between our Lord’s first coming and his future glorious second coming. As I hope to demonstrate in my sermon, this prophecy of Isaiah that we are considering this morning is a prediction about the messianic new covenant age, this present age of redemptive history that was ushered in at the first advent of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God. In our passage for this morning, we have a prediction that reveals God’s gracious plan to gather the nations together into his kingdom through the missionary labors of Christ’s church, and which also gives us as God’s people great hope and great confidence in the present as we look forward to our Lord’s future return at the end of this age.

The Reverend James G. Kirk introduces our passage with the following words. He writes, Isaiah’s vision is of the time when the mountain of the Lord shall be established. The nation shall flow to it as people seek to learn God’s ways. The law of the Lord will judge all nations fairly. It will be a time when weapons are reforged into instruments for cultivating the land. Sounds like a wonderful time, doesn’t it? But friends, that description offered by Reverend Kirk sounds quite different from the world in which we live today, doesn’t it? The world in which we live today is a world where news of violence, crime, war, terrorism, and other social upheavals continue to dominate the news cycle, as they’ve always dominated the news cycle. After all, as we’re told in Ecclesiastes, there’s nothing new under the sun.

How then are we to understand and interpret this passage, and how could it possibly be referring to this present new covenant messianic age? Well, these are some of the matters that we will be wrestling with as we consider this passage from God’s word on this Lord’s Day morning. Now, again, by way of reminder, let’s remember the setting and the context in which Isaiah gives this prophecy. Isaiah received his call to be a prophet probably sometime around 740 BC, and he was probably martyred by the wicked and brutal Manasseh, king of Judah, sometime around 680 BC. And so Isaiah’s prophetic ministry spanned many decades and numerous kings. He ministered in Judah, the southern kingdom, during a period of time when God’s people were often unfaithful and compromising, and in need of being challenged and called to renewed repentance for their sin.

His prophetic oracles often alternate between threats of judgment on the one hand, and promises of grace and mercy on the other hand. And what we have in our passage for this Lord’s Day morning is obviously a passage where there’s a note of hope. There’s a note of grace. Chapter one was dominated with the theme of judgment. Chapter two brings us into focus a promise of hope and mercy. And so as we turn our attention to our passage for this morning, we first of all focus on the opening verses, verses one through three. And let’s first of all consider the meaning and significance of the latter days. The meaning and significance of the latter days. Let me just read these verses again. The word that Isaiah the son of Amos saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem, it shall come to pass in the latter days, some versions say in the last days, that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be lifted up above the hills, and all nations shall flow to it, and many people shall come and say, come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways, and that we may walk in his paths.

For out of Zion shall go forth the law and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. Have you ever had a conversation with a fellow Christian who’s asked the question, I wonder if we are in the last days or in the latter days? That’s an interesting question, and it’s a question that I believe the Bible gives us some very clear direction on. And it’s a matter that is brought up by Isaiah in this passage. Let’s consider what he means by the last or the latter days. We start with verse one. The word that Isaiah the son of Amos saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. Chapter two begins much in the same way as chapter one did, and it talks about the word, the word that Isaiah saw. Now that’s an interesting way of expressing it, isn’t it?

Usually words are something that we hear, right? But Isaiah says the word that Isaiah the son of Amos saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. This language of Isaiah seeing a word, the reference to word, refers to divine revelation. Again, the Holy Spirit through Isaiah is making it clear to us as the reader that this is divine revelation. This is a direct message from God. Isaiah’s not giving his own thoughts, his own opinions, his own ideas. Isaiah is conveying to us as a prophet of the Lord, a spokesman for the Lord who has access to direct revelation from the Lord. He’s giving to us direct revelation from the Lord. And this language of him seeing the word, this may indicate that Isaiah received this perhaps by means of a vision. And yet, again, this language in verses two through four is not just found here in Isaiah chapter two.

Keep your finger in Isaiah two and let’s go ahead a little bit in the Old Testament to the book of Micah. Look with me if you would at Micah chapter four. Let me read the first five verses of Micah chapter four and see as I read this, listen if this sounds familiar to you. Micah four verses one through five. It shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and it shall be lifted up above the hills and people shall flow to it. And many nations shall come and say, Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths, for out of Zion shall go forth the law and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

He shall judge between the many peoples and shall decide disputes for strong nations far away, and they shall bear their, beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither there shall they learn war anymore. But they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree, and no one shall make them afraid, for the mouth of the Lord of hosts has spoken. For all the peoples walk each in the name of its God, but we will walk in the name of the Lord our God forever and ever. Does that sound familiar? Well, it ought to sound familiar because it’s almost verbatim, almost word for word, the same as our passage for today in Isaiah chapter 2. And some scholars have suggested that what Isaiah is conveying here is taken from Micah, or perhaps from a common prophetic tradition that was used by both Isaiah and Micah.

But whether this statement, whether this passage that we’re reading of in Isaiah chapter 2 is original with Isaiah or not, the Holy Spirit inspired Isaiah to use these words for his own purposes. Indeed, my friends, no damage to divine inspiration is given if Isaiah happened to have borrowed this from Micah or elsewhere. It is the word of the Lord one way or another. And it says this again in verse 2 of our passage for today, it shall come to pass when in the latter days. Now this terminology of the latter or the last days in general refers to a time in the future that is beyond the prophet’s own horizon. It is a time in the distant future from Isaiah’s perspective at least. But in what sense is he using this terminology of the latter days?

What latter days is he referring to? There’s been different understandings of this. For example, our dispensational friends view this as describing conditions during a future millennial kingdom. When it is believed that Christ will return and set up at his throne in an earthly rebuilt temple in the earthly Jerusalem. Others seem to view this as a description of the eternal state. Because of the idyllic conditions that are described in these verses, they say well this must be referring to the eternal state. Still others view this as a description of the present new covenant messianic age. This present age in which we live. And that is the view that I believe is the most correct view in view of our passage and its context. I agree with Dr. E.J. Young’s comments on this passage in his commentary on Isaiah.

Dr. Young writes, the period which is intended by the phrase the last days is the age of the Christian church which began its course with the first advent of Christ. It is true that from the Old Testament alone so much is not apparent. But in the Old Testament the phrase does signify the age or time of the messiah. The period of deliverance and salvation. Isaiah takes the figures which were the property of the Old Testament economy and makes them the vehicles of expression for the truths of salvation and blessing which were the characteristics of the age of grace. In other words, Isaiah uses old covenant language to describe new covenant realities that were coming down the road in the latter days. In other words, the age of the messiah. And you may say well pastor, how would his original readers get that from what he is saying here?

Well again, this is where we need to compare scripture with scripture. Isaiah’s original audience would not have fully understood the messianic implications of this passage, but when we compare scripture with scripture we see that the last days are these present days. This present messianic age. And the New Testament bears testimony to this. And just to give you a few examples of that. Let’s go to Hebrews chapter one. I read this earlier in the service, but Hebrews chapter one verses one and two, it says this. And remember, the author of Hebrews wrote this in the first century to first century Christians. And he says this, long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets. He describes an age referred to as long ago, past ages of redemptive history.

But then notice verse two, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his son. These last days. When our fellow believers ask the question, are we in the last days or the latter days? The correct biblical answer to that question is we’ve been in the last days or the latter days ever since Jesus came to this earth two thousand years ago. Ever since the advent and the life, the death, the resurrection and ascension of Christ. Ever since the pouring out of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost. That is what initiated the last days or the latter days, according to Hebrews chapter one. These last days, again, he wrote this in the first century. So these are the last or the latter days, the days of the Messiah, the age between the ages, the age between the first coming of Christ and his future second coming.

This is also confirmed, and this is there’s many other passages or numerous other passages that we could go to, but this is also confirmed just to give you one more passage in first John chapter two verse 18, where the apostle John writes, children, it is not it will be, but it is the last hour. And as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come. Therefore, we know that it is the last hour. John refers not just to the last or latter days, but the last hour, and he says we know that it is right now. It is the last hour. So we are in the last days, the last hour of redemptive history. We are in this age between the ages, this period of time between the first and second coming of Christ.

And these are the times that Isaiah speaks to in our passage for today. So what is the significance of these last days? Well, let’s go through the text. It shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established as the highest of the mountains and shall be lifted up above the hills. Now, is this a prediction that the temple mount on which the temple had been built, that somehow there will be a geological miracle and God will somehow cause this mountain to be higher than Mount Everest, for example, when it says the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established as the highest of the mountains? No, he’s speaking here of spiritual exaltation. See, in the ancient world, the gods of the heathen, the gods of the gentiles, were often worshipped on mountains.

The mountain of the house of the Lord obviously refers to the temple mount in Jerusalem, the place where Solomon’s temple was, the place where God chose to put his name, where he dwelt in a special way amongst his people. Remember, the temple of the Lord represented God’s reign among his people. That’s what the Ark of the Covenant represented, the Lord’s throne, and the temple also symbolized that God came to dwell among his people. So the temple represented God’s saving covenantal presence and dwelling amongst his people, as well as his sovereign reign over his people. But that temple of stone was never meant to be permanent. It pointed forward to something more significant, or I should say someone more significant, namely, Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh. As the Apostle John tells us in John chapter 1, the Word, the eternal divine Word, the Logos, the Lord Jesus Christ, became flesh.

He became incarnate and dwelt among us. He pitched his tent. He made his dwelling in our midst. Jesus Christ is described in Scripture as the living temple, and he ultimately fulfills this temple imagery here. So Isaiah here is using old covenant language and terminology and concepts to describe new covenant realities that have come with the coming of Christ and his church under the new covenant. And so it says, it shall come to pass that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established as the highest of the mountains. In other words, it will be spiritually, not in terms of height, but spiritually exalted. That means the gospel shall be exalted among the nations, and many shall flow into the kingdom of God through the proclamation of the gospel. As it says again in verse 2, this mountain shall be lifted up above the hills, and what will the result be?

All the nations shall flow to it. Isaiah the prophet has a universal perspective. The Holy Spirit inspired him to see beyond his own time when God’s covenant mercies were for the most part limited to the people of Israel. He looks forward to a time when the boundaries of God’s kingdom will go beyond the land of Israel, and the gospel will touch the nations of humanity, even the Gentiles. And so it says, all the nations shall flow to it, and many peoples shall come and say, come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob. Which translating that into new covenant terminology, let us go to Jesus, and let us go to where Jesus dwells, his church. There he will teach us that we may walk in his ways.

For out of Zion, and Zion is a symbol, a picture of the temple, and the temple mount, and ultimately again Zion is fulfilled in Christ. For out of Zion shall go forth the law and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem from his people, from Christ and his church. The word will go forth and touch the nations. Again this is Old Testament language being used to picture new covenant realities. For the ingathering of the Gentiles into Christ’s church and kingdom was only made possible by the advent of Christ, and by the missionary and evangelistic labors of Christ’s true visible church. And by the way, brothers and sisters, we are in part a fulfillment of this. For we come from different nations, different backgrounds, and we come and we gather around the word, we gather as the church to hear his word, and to learn how we may walk in his paths and according to his covenant instruction.

Again here we see a picture of Gentiles whose hearts have been regenerated and converted. And what do they say? They say, come let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths. What is the motivation? What is the desire being expressed in this language here? It is a teachable spirit, a desire to learn the ways of the Lord and to follow the ways of the Lord. And so, dear listener, we see here in this passage that the evidence of the new birth and conversion is that which includes a teachable spirit, a spirit eager to learn and follow the ways of the Lord. Dear listener, does this describe your current spiritual state? Do you in your heart resonate with these statements here in verse three?

Come let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths. Let us learn from him that we may obey him and follow him. One of the things that the spirit does when he converts us is he gives us a teachable heart, a heart that longs to know and understand the gospel. I remember before my conversion as a high schooler, I remember that I had an intellectual interest in the Bible before I came to faith and I used to occasionally read my Bible. But when God in sovereign mercy brought me to faith in Christ, something changed. All of a sudden, this book became much more interesting. I wanted to learn. I wanted to know more about this God who had sent his son to die for my sins.

I wanted to learn more about this God who had had mercy upon me, a wretched sinner. I wanted to learn his gospel more, to understand its ins and its outs. I’m not saying that we as believers are always zealous and teachable as we ought to be, but if you’ve been born again by the Holy Spirit, there is at some level and to some degree in your heart a desire to know the way of the Lord, to learn from him that you may walk with him out of gratitude for his amazing gift of salvation given to you in the Lord Jesus Christ. Is your heart, dear listener, truly eager, truly teachable? Do you hunger to know God’s word? Do you hunger to walk in his ways? If not, pray that the Lord would change your heart, would grant you the grace of his spirit, and come to Jesus.

Call upon him for salvation, for he died for sinners just like me and like you, and he rose from the dead so that whoever believes in him, whoever trusts in him, may not perish but have life everlasting. And so we see the meaning and significance of the latter days. We are in the latter days, and these are the days when the gospel goes out to the nations, and the nations are being brought in through the proclamation of the gospel. We notice next a description here in verse four of the peace of the messianic age. This is the second point in your sermon outline. Consider next the peace of the messianic age. It says in verse four, he shall judge between the nations and shall decide disputes for many peoples, and they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.

Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore. Here the latter days age ushered in by the messiah is idealized as a time of universal peace among the nations. It’s pictured as a time of international peace, a time when weapons of war and violence described here as swords and spears are to be refashioned into peaceful domestic instruments, plowshares and pruning hooks. In other words, friends, the messianic age is depicted as a time when implements of destruction are transformed into implements of production. It is precisely here that many Christians have trouble believing that this passage is a description of this present age. After all, there are still many wars and rumors of wars throughout the world today, are there not? Some folks, such as post-millennialists, believe that this verse refers to a future golden age of the church, a time before the return of Christ when the nations of the world will be converted on the whole and Christianized through the church’s missionary labors and through a great outpouring of the Holy Spirit.

And there’s an attractiveness to that view, isn’t there? I mean, what sane Christian wouldn’t want, wouldn’t want the vast majority of the world to be converted to Christ? Who would not want that? Who would not want the nations on the whole to hear the gospel and be convicted of their sins and come to the Lord in faith and repentance? Who would not want that? This is one possible way to understand this passage, but I think Dr. Young offers a wiser, more biblically sound, realistic perspective when he writes, even at the present day, insofar as men believe the gospel and seek to practice it in their lives, this prophecy finds fulfillment. At the same time, it must be remembered that sin is still present, and it will not be until the complete removal of sin at the second advent of the Lord that this prophecy will be realized in its completeness.

So again, we have much reason to be positive and hopeful. We believe in the power of the gospel to bring transformation into the lives of sinners and to bring them into a right relationship with God. The gospel is indeed the power of God unto salvation for everyone who believes. And yet even we who by grace have believed the gospel, we still struggle with sin. And even as we seek to know the Lord and grow in the Lord, we still have that battle between the flesh and the spirit going on within us. So again, it would seem that Isaiah here is using this idealistic, almost picturesque language of international peace to point to a deeper spiritual reality. He is pointing to the reality that in the new covenant age, in the age of the Messiah, people from all the nations, not just Jews who believe in Jesus, but even Gentiles will come to believe in Jesus and become part of the one covenant people of God.

Now, some have accused this teaching as being replacement theology. Oh, well, you reformed folks are saying that Israel has been replaced by the church. And friends, that’s not a correct characterization. It’s not replacement theology. It’s expansion theology. It’s fulfillment theology. Now the church, God’s covenant people, is not limited to a theocratic nation known as Israel or, you know, Israel was again divided into the northern and southern kingdom and so forth. So even under the old covenant, it wasn’t just technically one nation, but still the gospel is not just limited to the Jews and to Gentiles who happen to convert to the God of Israel and become Jews themselves. Now the gospel is for all the nations. The word goes out to all the nations. Now all people who believe in Jesus as Messiah become part of the one true covenant people of God, the Israel of God.

And so friends, this happens because Jesus has come. And this is what this passage is pointing to. The union of Jew and Gentile who believe in the Messiah are brought together in one body into the one people of God. By his incarnation and saving work, Jesus Christ our Lord has already, at least in principle, secured this spiritual peace. And that’s what this passage, using the language of international peace, is pointing to. And we see this fulfilled, for example, as the apostle Paul comments in Ephesians chapter 2 verses 14 through 19. Let me invite you to turn there briefly to Ephesians chapter 2 verses 14 through 19. Paul writes, and he’s writing in this epistle to mostly Gentile Christians, and he talks about how the Lord has brought together both Jew and Gentile into one body.

He says, for he, that’s Christ, he himself is our peace, our meaning us Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians. He himself is our peace who has made us both one. There’s not two peoples of God, the earthly people of God, the Jews, and the spiritual people, the church. No, there’s one people of God. There’s the one Israel of God, the church of the Lord Jesus Christ, which consists of both Jews and Gentiles who believe in Jesus. For he himself is our peace who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility. That dividing wall that the old covenant set up between Jew and Gentile through the ceremonial and the ritual laws, that dividing wall has been broken down. How? Verse 15, by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace.

This is the peace of the new covenant era that Isaiah is pointing to and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. And he came and preached peace to you who were far off, that would be the Gentiles, and to those who were near, that would be the Jews. For through him, through Christ, we both have access in one spirit to the Father. So then you, you Gentiles, are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God. And so friends, as it says in verse four of our passage, he shall judge between the nations and shall decide disputes for many peoples. They shall beat their swords into plowshares, their spears into pruning hooks. Nations shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.

In principle, this is fulfilled in this present age in the church as people from every tribe, tongue, language, and nation are brought into the church through the preaching of the gospel. Friends, our Lord Jesus, the Prince of Peace, said in Matthew five, nine, blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. By the grace of God, let us be eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace, as we are exhorted to do in Ephesians four, verse three. But as we close our time in our passage for today in verse five, we notice in conclusion the moral imperative of these latter-day promises, the moral imperative of these latter-day promises. We’ve considered the meaning and significance of the latter days. We’ve considered the peace that Christ has brought into these latter days, bringing Jew and Gentile together into one body.

But finally, consider the moral imperative of these latter days, these latter-day promises. As Isaiah writes in verse five, O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of Yahweh, the light of the Lord, Yahweh, Israel’s faithful covenant-making, covenant-keeping God. I think the point that Isaiah is making here in this language is that since the Gentile nations will in the latter days seek Yahweh and his word, should not the professed covenant people of God among Isaiah’s contemporaries, described here as the house of Jacob, should they not walk in the sense of live in faith and obedience to God’s ways? Since even the Gentiles will come to walk in the ways of the Lord, should not you, my contemporaries, walk in the light of the Lord, you know, in faith and obedience to the Lord?

And friends, should not we who are God’s professed covenant people today in this new covenant messianic era, should we not seek to walk the talk and live out the implications of the truth that we learn from God’s holy word? What is the goal of learning the ways of the Lord? Well, dear ones, according to our passage, the goal of learning the word of God is so that we may walk in his paths, as we are told in verse three. Let us go to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways. Why? That we may walk in his paths. The goal of learning sound doctrine is not merely stuffing our heads full of Bible knowledge and theological truth, as important as that is. We in the OPC value the importance of Bible knowledge, doctrinal knowledge, and so forth.

But the goal of doctrinal instruction is not just increasing our knowledge level. The Bible says knowledge puffs up. Knowledge is a good thing, but knowledge not applied can lead to pride. The goal of doctrinal instruction is discipleship. The end goal of instruction in the ways of the Lord is obedient living unto the Lord. Learning Bible truth without living out what you learn will make you a self-righteous Pharisee. Beloved, let us make learning sound doctrine a top priority in our lives and in the church, but let us also make sure that we are learning so that we might live out the implications of what we learn in faith and obedience, so that we may be doers of the word and not hearers only who deceive ourselves. May God, in his grace, grant that it may be so.

Amen. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you, Lord God, for your amazing grace and mercy to us in Christ. We thank you that we have the privilege to live in the Messianic New Covenant era of this present age. We thank you that you have sent your Son Jesus to be Savior and Messiah and that he has already come and has died for our sins and risen again, that we might receive the gift of eternal life through faith in him alone. Lord, as we await his second coming, we pray that we might be found faithful. We pray that you would grant us the grace not only to believe the gospel, but also to show our gratitude for your amazing gift of salvation by seeking to walk in the light of the Lord. We ask all these things, Heavenly Father, in Jesus’ name, and all of God’s people said, Amen.

Let’s close our time together today by rising and we’ll sing as our closing hymn, number 403, Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken, 403.

The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.

June 23, 2024
Redeemed by Justice

About this sermon

Isaiah laments that the faithful city has become a harlot: her silver has become dross and her princes companions of thieves who neglect the fatherless and the widow. The Lord will avenge himself on his enemies and smelt away Zion’s dross, restoring faithful judges. “Zion shall be redeemed by justice, and those in her who repent, by righteousness,” but the Lord will break the rebels. The return from exile points to the eternal redemption Christ accomplished, satisfying God’s justice against his people’s sin.

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Sermon transcript

Please remain standing for the reading of God’s Word. My sermon text this morning as we continue our new series in the book of the prophet Isaiah is Isaiah chapter 1 verses 21 through 31. You’ll find that on page 673 in your Pew Bibles. Isaiah chapter 1 verses 21 through 31. Let us hear God’s holy word. How the faithful city has become a whore. She who was full of justice. Righteousness lodged in her but now murderers. Your silver has become dross. Your best wine mixed with water. Your princes are rebels and companions of thieves. Everyone loves a bribe and runs after gifts. They do not bring justice to the fatherless and the widow’s cause does not come to them. Therefore the Lord declares the Lord of hosts the mighty one of Israel. I will get relief from my enemies and avenge myself on my foes.

I will turn my hand against you and will smelt away your dross as with lie and remove all your alloy and I will restore your judges as at the first and your counselors as at the beginning. Afterward you shall be called the city of righteousness the faithful city. Zion shall be redeemed by justice and those in her who repent by righteousness but rebels and sinners shall be broken together and those who forsake the Lord shall be consumed for they shall be ashamed of the oaks that you desired and you shall blush for the gardens that you have chosen for you shall be like an oak whose leaf withers and like a garden without water and the strong shall become tender and his work a spark and both of them shall burn together with none to quench them.

The grass withers and the flower fades but the word of our God endures forever. Let’s pray for the Lord to bless the preaching of his word. Our Lord and Father in heaven we thank you for the scriptures for as the scriptures themselves testify of themselves all scripture is breathed out by God and is profitable. We pray that by the illuminating work of your spirit we would find this portion of holy scripture to be profitable to us and to our spiritual benefit. We pray Lord that you would open our minds and our hearts to behold wondrous things from your word and we pray that your spirit would cause your word to find a lodging place in our souls this day and once again we would ask that you by your grace would set a guard over my lips that I might speak only that which is faithful and edifying and glorifying in your sight.

In Jesus name we pray and all of God’s people said Amen. You may be seated. The title of my sermon this morning is Redeemed by Justice and if you are following along in your sermon outline there are quite a number of key words that the young people can be listening for in the sermon to help them follow along. Well dear ones even though our passage for this Lord’s Day morning was addressed to the visible people of God who lived in Jerusalem and Judah during the days of the prophet Isaiah, nevertheless this passage of God’s word is quite instructive and quite relevant to the church in all ages of redemptive history including the church of Jesus Christ today in the 21st century. Beloved this is a passage that we as a church would do well to take to heart because in this passage the Holy Spirit through his servant Isaiah addresses the professed people of God during a time in the old covenant theocracy when political corruption and social injustices abounded in the land of Judah and also a time when spiritual degeneracy and idolatrous impurity prevailed among those who identified themselves as the people of God.

The old covenant church is represented in this passage by the once faithful city of Jerusalem and also represented by Zion which is a synonym for the city of Jerusalem in general but also a designation that was used to refer to the locality where the majestic temple of God erected by the great and wise King Solomon had been set up. In earlier times such as perhaps during the reigns of King David and King Solomon in the period of the united monarchy in that time righteousness prevailed. Righteousness, right ethical conduct and justice as defined by God’s holy law had once characterized the holy city of Jerusalem and Isaiah reflects upon that time. He says in verse 21 how the faithful city has become a whore. It had once been characterized by faithfulness but now by unfaithfulness. At one time the old covenant church on the whole had sought to trust in Yahweh her covenant Lord and to live in grateful obedience to his holy law but things had radically changed in the days of the prophet Isaiah.

They had changed to the point that in this passage the Lord describes his people as being characterized by spiritual adultery and murderous injustice and he even goes so far as to call his own unfaithful people my enemies and my foes as we see in verse 24. Therefore the Lord declares the Lord of hosts, the mighty one of Israel, ah I will get relief from my enemies and avenge myself of my foes. He’s not talking there about the idol worshiping pagan gentiles. He’s not talking about Israel’s neighbors here. He’s talking about those who would call themselves the circumcised, the people of God. In this language I am reminded of the biblical truth that is stated so well in our beloved Westminster Confession of Faith in its teachings on the visible church. In chapter 25 section 5 of our confession of faith we read these words, the purest churches under heaven are subject both to mixture and error and some have so degenerated as to become no churches of Christ but synagogues of Satan.

Nevertheless there shall be always a church on earth to worship God according to his will. Certainly the old covenant church of Isaiah’s day was in the midst of a downward spiritual spiral, a spiral of spiritual degeneracy that called forth the holy judgment and wrath of God and yet even in this judgment passage, even in this passage where God is declaring his judgment against his faithless people it is clear that Yahweh would preserve for himself a repentant faithful remnant and that his predicted judgment against his faithless people would not result in a complete or final destruction of the visible church but instead would result in a purified and restored people of God. As we prepare to dive in and consider the this passage and the lessons that we can glean from it, I would remind you of the setting and context in which the prophet Isaiah ministered.

The Lord raised up the prophet Isaiah to minister to the southern kingdom of Judah for a period of at least 40 years. His prophetic ministry spanned the reigns of four kings lasting from about 740 BC until sometime after 701 BC. Indeed the opening verse of the book of Isaiah makes this very clear. If you go back to chapter 1 verse 1, Isaiah explains when he ministers, ministered. It says the vision of Isaiah the son of Amos which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem, the southern kingdom and its peoples, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah. So that gives us a very clear picture of when and where the prophet Isaiah ministered. In our passage beloved we have first of all a lamentation over the faithlessness of the people and their rulers.

We also have a declaration of God’s judgment against those who persist unrepentant in their rebellion and unbelief. But we also have here in this passage a promise of redemption and restoration. In wrath the Lord remembers mercy. So let’s first of all consider the opening section of our passage namely verses 21 through 23. And here we have brothers and sisters a lamentation over faithless Jerusalem. One very common literary form in the Old Testament especially is the literary form of lament, lamentation. In our church culture today we don’t tend to gravitate towards lament. We more tend to gravitate towards praise and so forth. And there’s a place for both though in the life of God’s children and in the life of the church of Jesus Christ. And here we have a lamentation and that is indicated by in the Hebrew by the very first word here.

How, the word how. How the faithful city has become a whore, she who was full of justice. It is this is language that typically introduced lament. And notice how notice the address of this lament. How what? The faithful city has become a whore. What city is Isaiah referring to? It seems clear from the context of the book of Isaiah that he is referring here to Jerusalem. The capital city of the southern kingdom. The holy city where the Lord’s temple dwelt. The Lord’s temple representing symbolizing his sovereign reign and his gracious covenant presence in the midst of his people. And so this faithful city is Jerusalem the holy city. And that city had at one time been faithful on the whole. Perhaps Isaiah is thinking of more stable times in Israel’s past history such as during the reign of King David.

He’s not saying that everyone in the city was a true believer or that everyone was faithful to the Lord’s Torah, his covenant instruction or direction. But Jerusalem as a whole, the people of Jerusalem as a whole had been characterized by a trust in the Lord and a desire to live in covenant faithfulness to the Lord. But things had changed. He says how the faithful city has become a whore. That’s strong language isn’t it? That’s indeed scandalous language. Isaiah uses this almost scandalously shocking language that depicts either the people’s covenant breaking idolatry or their social injustices or as I think more likely both of those aspects of the people’s rebellion. These things are described as a form of spiritual adultery. The people were being spiritually adulterous toward Yahweh, the Lord, their faithful covenant making, covenant keeping God.

The Lord who had graciously redeemed them from their slavery in Egypt and had bound himself to them as a husband does to a wife in the covenant. They had broken the covenant. They had rebelled against the Lord. They had forsaken him to go after other gods and they had forsaken his way by conducting themselves in murderous injustice toward their fellow Israelites. And so the Lord describes them as spiritual whores. Often the prophets of the Old Testament describe the idolatry and the apostasy of the people as a form of spiritual adultery since Yahweh is often pictured as the husband of his people Israel and Israel is often described or referred to as the Lord’s wife. Just to give you a few examples of that turn for example to Jeremiah chapter 2 and look at verse 20 Jeremiah chapter 2 verse 20.

The prophet Jeremiah writes or the Lord through Jeremiah states for long ago I broke your yoke and burst your bonds that’s referring to God’s redeeming grace in rescuing his people from their enslavement in Egypt for long ago I broke your yoke and burst your bonds but you said I will not serve yet on every high hill and under every green tree you bowed down like a whore you were unfaithful to me though I had rescued and redeemed you you were unfaithful to me and you went after other gods or consider Jeremiah 3 verses 1 through 3 the prophet asks if a man divorces his wife and she goes from him and becomes another man’s wife will he return to her would not that land be greatly polluted you have played the whore with many lovers in other words you’ve gone after many other gods and would you return to me declares the Lord lift up your eyes to the bear heights and see where have you not been ravished by the way sides you have sat waiting lovers like an Arab in the wilderness you have polluted the land with your vile whoredom therefore the showers have been withheld and the spring rain has not come yet you have the forehead of a whore you refused to be ashamed or one more passage to drive this point home consider Hosea chapter 3 verse 1 where the Lord calls this prophet to to marry an unfaithful woman Hosea chapter 3 verse 4 where it says this this for the children of Israel shall dwell many days without king or prince without sacrifice or pillar without ephod or household gods I’m sorry verse 1 and the Lord said to me go again love a woman who is loved by another man and is an adulteress even as the Lord loves the children of Israel though they turn to other gods and love cakes of raisins he’s not saying that there’s anything sinful in enjoying raisins he said those cakes of raisins were used in pagan idolatrous worship practices and so forth and so we see Yahweh the covenant god of Israel he is like a husband to his people and his people are like his wife he has bound himself to them in covenant love and mercy but how do they respond they go after other lovers they pursue other gods they break his law they forsake his trust in him they live in impenitence this imagery of God relating to his people as a husband does to a wife is carried over obviously into the New Testament for how are we as the church described in the New Testament well the church is is described among other things as the bride of Christ Christ is the head and husband of his wife the church and we as the church are the bride of Christ and so the city had been faithful but they had now become unfaithful and are described in this language of whoredom and not only that he goes on to say in verse 21 righteousness lodged in her what is righteousness righteousness is being in the right with God being in a right relationship with God and that is reflected in your ethical conduct in seeking to live rightly before God in in seeking to engage in right conduct in obedience to the Torah the holy law and covenant instruction of the Lord he says righteousness lodged in her at one time righteousness lodged in the holy city Jerusalem but now murderers the opposite of notice the sharp contrast righteousness had once lodged in Jerusalem but now murderers the context indicates that it is probably the corrupt leaders in Jerusalem who are specifically in view here but remember friends that the leaders can also represent and characterize the people in general idolatry and unfaithfulness to the Lord tends to breed the social injustices that lead to a devaluation of life a culture of death and thus the commonality of murder and violence and so what does this instruct us as the church today how does this instruct us to well to quote from Dr.

E.J. Young and his commentary he says even the purest churches on earth may degenerate into a synagogue of satan how all important that we who are members of Christ’s church be always vigilant and cherish and love that church that she may ever be found faithful before him as Isaiah continues this lament he goes on to say in verse 22 your silver has become dross your best wine mixed with water what is he talking about what do the silver and the best wine represent in this passage well these are probably symbols that Isaiah is using or that the spirit through Isaiah is using for how a once faithful political class had degenerated into corrupt politicians and that’s made clear it seems by the context if you read verse 22 in the light of verse 23 in verse 23 the Lord through Isaiah says your princes are rebels and companions of thieves everyone loves a bribe they’re bought and paid for everyone loves a bribe and runs after gifts they do not bring justice to the fatherless never their priority is not in pursuing and seeking to maintain justice and righteousness in society and and ministering to the needs of the weakest and most vulnerable in society their priority is enriching themselves through bribes and gifts of course that never happens today in the politics of today right dr young writes Jerusalem once possessed something desirable something like silver or wine Jerusalem once possessed something desirable represented by silver and choice wine a great change however had come over the city the silver and choice wine are gone and in their place are dross and wine mixed with water the language in the Hebrew Hebrew for wine mixed with water it it could literally be translated a wine circumcised or castrated by water it’s very dramatic and picturesque language that is used here there has been a degeneracy from in in the political class of the people of God and then it goes on to say in verse 23 again your princes are rebels and companions of thieves everyone loves a bribe and runs after gifts they do not bring justice to the fatherless and the widow’s cause does not come to them we often read in the old testament prophets about God’s concern for the widow and the orphan because friends the widows and the orphans if you lived in the ancient world they didn’t have a social support system like we do today if you were a widow and you didn’t have you know you could you couldn’t return to your father’s house let’s say that your father had passed away you were destitute likewise if you were an orphan the widows and orphans as well as strangers those who were who were strangers in the land represented the most vulnerable most prone to and open to being taken advantage of and those are the folks that God has a special concern for but those who were leaders among God’s people the professed people of God in their leadership class were not concerned for them but for their own enrichment as I said everyone loves a bribe that was the way it was in the day of Isaiah the prophet this is very much unlike the Lord consider Deuteronomy 10 verse 17 what we learn about the Lord in Deuteronomy 10 verse 17 where the Lord says this about himself for the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords the great the mighty and the awesome God who is not partial and takes no bribe you cannot bribe the Lord he is holy he is just he will not take a bribe and therefore those who serve him must not seek after bribes beloved from this lamentation we can learn much but let us in the church today let us not follow the road of spiritual degeneracy followed by the ancient people of God in Isaiah’s day instead by the grace of God let us hold fast to the pure word of God let us hold fast to the pure gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ the good news of full and free salvation through the obedient life atoning death and glorious bodily resurrection and ascension of Christ our Lord and let us also worship God in spirit and in truth according to the prescriptions of his word and let us by the grace of God seek to live as obedient disciples out of gratitude for his marvelous gift of salvation in Christ we next learn in this passage of a divine declaration of both vengeance and restoration this is the second point in your sermon outline we see next in verses 24 through 26 in particular a divine declaration of both vengeance and restoration it says this in verse 24 therefore the Lord declares the Lord of hosts the mighty one of Israel ah I will get relief from my enemies and avenge myself of my foes now notice the how how the Holy Spirit inspires Isaiah to pile up titles for the Lord for God he is described first of all as the Lord the Hebrew for this term indicates the master and sovereign overall it emphasizes the absolute sovereignty of God and he is also described as Yahweh of hosts the Lord of hosts now what are these hosts well sometimes that terminology is used in scripture to refer to the heavenly hosts the stars and the galaxies and so forth and certainly our great God our omnipotent God is sovereign over the starry hosts but it can also be used to refer to military hosts the angels and archangels of heaven and so I believe that is how it’s being used here the Lord is reminding his people that he is sovereign that he is absolute in his sovereignty he is the master and he is the divine warrior who goes out to fight for his people and to bring justice to bear and he is also described here as the mighty one of Israel again this this stresses his omnipotent power these titles are titles that that stress Yahweh’s absolute authority and utterly omnipotent power and so the implication is rebels beware realize who you’re messing with by rejecting the Lord turning from him he is the Lord the Lord of hosts the mighty one of Israel God’s unfaithful people are here described as well as Yahweh’s enemies and foes as I pointed out a little while ago now I believe brothers and sisters that this is very instructive in that it shows that the Lord’s enemies may be found even within the ranks of those who hold membership in the visible church within the visible covenant community may be found both the righteous and the unrighteous both the saved and the unsaved both the regenerate and the unregenerate both the elect and the reprobate when unfaithfulness prevails in the visible organized church as it did in Isaiah’s day then there comes a point in time it seems when the Lord must act when he must turn his hand against the unbelieving and unrepentant among his professed people as the Lord says in verse 24 I will get relief from my enemies and avenge myself on my foes I will turn my hand against you focus in on that for a minute now let me ask you children does God literally have a physical hand no God is a spirit and has not a body like we do right this is what the theologians and Bible scholars call anthropomorphic language this is a language that describes God using human terminology in order to make it understandable to us because God is transcendent and the only way we can understand God is if he sort of talks baby talk to us he comes down to our level and speaks to us in a way that we can understand but what really struck me as I was preparing my sermon for today from this passage is the statement where the Lord says I will turn my hand against you this is a promise or a threat to judge and purify as by fire now perhaps the Babylonian exile is in view as the historical fulfillment of this prophecy but I know I would point out beloved that this is the opposite of what God promises in the gospel of Christ to to the believers in Christ in passages like Romans 831 in that passage it says if God be for us you know the answer if God be for us what who can be against us praise God if you are in Christ God is for you he is for you 100 percent of the way but here God is saying to the rebels to the unbelievers amongst the ranks of the professed people of God he says I will turn my hand against you if it is true that if God be for us no one can be against us it is also true that if God is against you well you’re toast basically if God is against you no one and nothing can help you especially since the Lord unlike the unjust leaders of the Israelite people at this time the Lord does not take bribes Yahweh stands against the unrepentant and unfaithful among his people this reminds me of what the scripture says in a different context in first Peter 417 where the apostle writes that judgment begins with the household of God but there’s good news even in this pronouncement of solemn judgment there’s good news because it goes on to say I will turn my hand against you to do what and will smelt away your dross with lie and remove all your alloy and I will restore your judges as at the first and your counselors as at the beginning afterward you shall be called the city of righteousness the faithful city right now as Isaiah is writing it writing this the city of Jerusalem Jerusalem and especially its leaders and the people as well were characterized by spiritual adultery by spiritual whoredom and by murderous violence but the Lord will bring judgment in such a way as they will be restored to the point where they will be called the city of righteousness the faithful city the Lord’s purifying judgment is ultimately designed to restore divine purification leads to restoration and the reestablishment of righteousness divine purification leads to restoration and the reestablishment of righteousness how is this fulfilled well this was initially fulfilled in the Babylonian exile God did bring his judgment upon his people he exiled them from the land the wicked amongst them were were slaughtered many of them and the people were in their exile renewed a remnant was preserved and renewed and brought back to the land eventually so that I believe is the initial historical fulfillment of this this prophecy but my friends ultimately this will be fulfilled not merely by the people’s return from their exile in Babylon but through the saving work of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the messianic era of the new covenant the age in which we now live what we learn here about our God beloved is that our God will both judge and restore he is a God of justice and a God of mercy righteousness and grace and he will bring his judgment upon those who persist impenitent in their wickedness for the praise of his glorious justice but he will also bring his undeserved mercy and grace into the hearts and lives of his people he will give them the grace of repentance and this will be to the praise of his glorious grace praise be to God for his sovereign omnipotent grace and this brings me to my final point as we reflect upon the closing section of this passage verses 27 to 31 redemption for the repentant but wrath for the rebels we learn here of redemption for the repentant but wrath for the rebels verse 27 says Zion and again remember Zion is either a synonym for Jerusalem or perhaps for the temple in Jerusalem the temple area in Jerusalem Zion shall be redeemed by justice and those in her who repent by righteousness but rebels and sinners shall be broken together and those who forsake the Lord shall be consumed according to Dr.

Young the verb here for redeemed denotes a deliverance that is obtained by means of payment of a price perhaps the immediate historic redemption that is in view here in this prophecy is God’s act of redeeming his people from their exile in Babylon and bringing them back into the promised land having poured his justice out upon them in chastisement for their covenant faithlessness however my friends this that temporal historic redemption points to and anticipates ultimate eternal redemption that ultimate and eternal redemption that was accomplished by Christ for Christ satisfied the holy justice of God against our sins by bearing the punishment of our sins on the cross of Calvary as Dr. Young points out there would however be little comfort to the inhabitants of Judah in the thought that they were to be redeemed through their own righteousness for the truly devout among them would realize that they had no righteousness and of course only Christ’s only Christ is capable of meeting the righteous requirements that are necessary for the redemption of sinners like me and like you and if this righteousness is this redemption by justice is for whom for those in her who repents verse 27 Zion shall be redeemed by justice and those in her who repent by righteousness and of course repentance itself as the scriptures testify is a sovereignly bestowed gift of God God grants repentance so it’s all of God it’s all of grace but then there is a warning a sharp contrast given in verse 28 this is a sharp contrast to the preceding verse but rebels and sinners shall be broken together and those who forsake the Lord shall be consumed while redemption and restoration are promised to the repentant those who remain on repentant and unbelieving will be consumed by the fiery holy wrath of the Lord and so it goes on to say in verse 29 for they shall be ashamed of the oaks that you desired and you shall blush for the gardens that you have chosen now does this mean that if you enjoy planting trees or working on your garden that that’s somehow sinful activity well it can become sinful if you make an idol out of it but the point here is that this probably this language probably has in view the idolatrous pagan religious rites that were practiced by the canaanites in the land and which often took place under trees and in gardens many pagan temples in the ancient world had temple gardens and so when we read about the high places and we read about the trees and the gardens and God through the prophets rebuking his people for worshiping under the oaks and and the sacred gardens and so forth he is he is rebuking them for their idolatrous practices the Israelites were often guilty of incorporating these pagan beliefs and rituals into their own religious practices and the prophets often denounced God’s people for this kind of idolatrous syncretism and notice how the Lord describes the people here he says they shall be ashamed of the oaks that you desired they desired these this false worship and these false gods and you shall blush for the gardens that you have chosen dr young writes of this he says therefore there would however be little i’m sorry i missed the quote there the quote is God had chosen Israel to be his people but Israel had chosen gardens the Lord had graciously chosen his people and redeemed them but they had chosen false gods they had chosen to worship in the gardens and so what is the Lord say is going to happen to them look at verse 30 for you shall be like an oak they shall be ashamed of the oaks where they performed pagan rites for you shall be like an oak whose leaf withers and like a garden without water the emphasis on without water is it’s emphatic in the hebrew again you have chosen and what would they be like they would resemble the objects of their worshipful delights but only in decaying forms they would be like the oaks like an oak but an oak whose leaf withers they would be like a garden but a garden without water those of you who are in gardening into gardening what happens if your garden is not properly watered it dies it withers it fades this reminds me of a sermon that i once heard many many moons ago in seminary preached by dr greg beal and i forget which passage that dr beal used but i do remember the sermon point because it was very it was one of those points that really sticks in your mind the point was we resemble what we revere for ruin or restoration we resemble what we revere for ruin or restoration if you worship idols you will become like the idols you worship that is the clear teaching of scripture you’ll become lifeless and immobile incapable of lifting a finger to help yourself indeed it’s only by the grace of god that we are helped and so he goes on to say in closing this passage and the strong shall become tinder and his work a spark and both of them shall burn together with none to quench them the wicked and their works in view here are works that would include idolatry works of self-righteousness self-justification and works of social injustice in defiance of god’s law the wicked and their works will be burned up but there is hope this passage presents hope hope for those who by the grace of god repent and dear listener the good news is that though we like israel of old we have been guilty of spiritual immorality spiritual adultery but there is hope for those who repent and god promises to take us through the judgment because christ was judged in our place in our stead and he promises to cleanse us to restore us and to make us to to establish us in righteousness jesus christ died for sinners like you and me and rose from the dead so that whoever believes in him might not perish but have eternal life and might receive the gift of everlasting righteousness look to christ and you brothers and sister will be not an oak whose leaf withers but you will be established and rooted in christ forever let us pray heavenly father we thank you and praise you for your grace and goodness to us in christ and we would ask oh lord that by your grace these truths would find a lodging place in our souls we ask heavenly father that we would indeed put into practice that which we’ve learned today for your praise and honor and glory in jesus name we pray and all of god’s people said amen as we sing our final hymn our hymn of commitment let’s rise and we’ll sing together number 467 cast down oh god the idols 467

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June 16, 2024
Trampling the Courts of the LORD

About this sermon

Isaiah calls Jerusalem’s rulers “Sodom” and Judah’s people “Gomorrah”: the Lord is weary of their sacrifices, new moons, and assemblies, because they come with blood on their hands. Their worship was correct in form but empty of repentance and faith, while they neglected the fatherless and the widow. The Lord calls them to wash, cease from evil, and seek justice, and offers cleansing: though their sins are like scarlet, they shall be white as snow. If they refuse, the sword will devour them.

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Sermon transcript

Friends, please remain standing for the reading of God’s Word as we have begun a new sermon series in the book of the prophet Isaiah. This morning we consider Isaiah chapter 1 verses 10 through 20. I’m going to begin reading in verse 9 to remind us of the previous context, but our focus will be on verses 10 through 20 of Isaiah chapter 1. You’ll find that beginning on page 672 in your Pew Bible. Dear ones, let us hear God’s holy word. If the Lord of hosts had not left us a few survivors, we should have been like Sodom and become like Gomorrah. Hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom. Severe to the teaching of our God, you people of Gomorrah. What to me is the multitude of your sacrifices, says the Lord? I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fad of well-fed beasts.

I do not delight in the blood of bulls or of lambs or of goats. When you come to appear before me, who has required of you this trampling of my courts? Bring no more vain offerings. Incense is an abomination to me. Your new moon and Sabbath and the calling of convocations, I cannot endure iniquity and solemn assembly. Your new moons and your appointed feasts, my soul hates. They have become a burden to me. I am weary of bearing them. When you spread out your hands, I will hide my eyes from you. Even though you make many prayers, I will not listen. Your hands are full of blood. Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean, remove the evil of your deeds from before my eyes. Cease to do evil, learn to do good. Seek justice, correct oppression, bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow’s cause.

Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord. Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool. If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land. But if you refuse and rebel, you shall be eaten by the sword, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken. Dear ones, the grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever. Let’s pray for the Lord to bless the proclamation of his word. O heavenly Father, we thank you that you speak to us. You are not a mute God. You are not a silent deity. You are a God who has spoken to us. You have spoken to us your law. You have given to us clear moral guidance and direction in the Scriptures.

But you have also spoken to us the word of forgiveness, the Gospel. We pray, heavenly Father, that we might hear both your law and your Gospel this morning in this portion of Holy Scripture. And we ask that by your Spirit you would illuminate our minds and open our hearts to the truths of this word, of your word, revealed here. And help us, Lord, to take these truths to heart. And may your word have its intended effect and impact upon our souls this day. We pray these things in Jesus’ name and all of God’s people’s said. Amen. You may be seated. Dear friends, the title of my sermon today is Trampling the Courts of the Lord. And if you’re following along in your sermon outline, I’ve suggested a number of words that you can be listening for in my sermon today if you find that to be helpful in following along the words worship, trampling, hypocrisy, repentance, and reformation.

Well dear friends, our beloved Westminster Shorter Catechism teaches us in the answer to the very first question, it teaches us that man’s chief end is to what? Man’s chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. The Bible, God’s holy word, teaches this truth throughout its pages. And so, for example, in the inspired words of St. Paul the Apostle as recorded in 1 Corinthians 10 verse 31, Paul writes, so whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. Do all to the glory of God. Not just the religious stuff, not just prayer and Bible reading and the singing of praises and so forth, those certainly should be done to the glory of God. But even mundane activities like taking your daily nourishment, eating your bread, and drinking from the cup, all of these things are to be done to the glory of God.

But dear ones, not only is man’s chief end to glorify and enjoy God forever, the Bible also indicates that God’s chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy himself forever. Now, that might sound narcissistic, why would God need to do that? Well, God knows that he is the highest and greatest good, and so it would be idolatry for him to do anything else than to seek as his highest end his own glory. This is reflected in passages, for example, like Romans chapter 11 verses 33 to 36, after the Apostle Paul has spent many chapters expounding upon and explaining the glorious gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ, he ends this discussion in the following words in Romans 11 beginning at verse 33, Paul writes, Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God, how unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways.

For who has known the mind of the Lord or who has been his counselor or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid? For from him and through him and to him are all things, to him be glory forever. Once again, my friends, God himself is the highest good. So if God were to seek something other than his own glory as his highest and chief end, then God himself would be guilty of idolatry. But in any case, it is because God’s chief end is to glorify and enjoy himself within the sublime majesty of his infinitely glorious triune being. It’s because of that that he takes his own worship so seriously. It’s not that he needs our worship, but he desires for his glory to be reflected and displayed in our worship of him.

This is also why our sovereign triune creator God takes such great offense when his professed people offer him superficial, hypocritical, shallow, and vain worship. Such hypocritical worship involves a trampling, that is to say a profaning of the courts of the Lord, and such was the so-called worship that Isaiah’s contemporaries were guilty of offering to their God. Now on the last Lord’s Day as I introduced the prophet Isaiah and as we consider the first nine verses of Isaiah chapter one, we learned that given the details recorded for us in the opening verse of this chapter, verse one, those details indicate that Isaiah was a prophet to the southern kingdom of Judah. Remember that at this point in covenant history, there was no longer a united monarchy. The ten tribes in the northern kingdom, typically called Sumeria, had broken off, and the Davidic tribe, the tribe of Judah, as well as many of Benjamin, the tribe of Benjamin, were in the southern kingdom of Judah.

And so Isaiah was called as a prophet to minister to the southern kingdom of Judah. The list of kings that are mentioned in the opening verse indicates that Isaiah’s ministry as a prophet lasted at least 40 years from about 740 BC until some point after the Jerusalem siege in 701 BC in the time of King Hezekiah. So again, going back to verse one of Isaiah chapter one, the vision, that means the revelation, the vision of Isaiah the son of Amos, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem, that indicates he’s been called by God to minister the word of God to the southern kingdom, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah. Again, these are southern kings. So this helps to situate Isaiah’s prophecy. And yet even though the southern kingdom was blessed to have the holy city of Jerusalem in its midst as its capital city, even though the holy temple, the temple that Solomon had built was there in Jerusalem, yet we find the Lord complaining against the worship offered by his people.

And that brings me, as we dive into our text for today, that brings me to the first point as we consider verses 10 through 15. Consider first, beloved, Yahweh’s complaint against the vain worship of his people. We see here Yahweh, the Lord’s complaint against his sinful people, the vain worship of his people. Hear the word of the Lord, he says in verse 10. Now notice the word Lord is in all capital letters, and what that signifies when the English translators translate that word in all capital letters, it indicates to us that they are translating the Hebrew name for God, Yahweh. Yahweh is sometimes transliterated incorrectly, in my opinion, as Jehovah. But this is the covenant name for God, the name for the Lord that indicates his special covenantal relationship with the people of Israel, as they’re making covenant keeping God and as their gracious Redeemer.

But here the Lord complains against the vain worship of his people, and he says, hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of what? You rulers of Sodom? Give ear to the teaching of our God, again, he’s basically saying the same thing, using slightly different words. Give ear to the teaching of our God, you people of Gomorrah. He addresses his people as Sodom and Gomorrah, and this harkens back, by the way, to verse nine, where he had said, if the Lord of hosts had not left us a few survivors, we should have been like Sodom and become like Gomorrah. Other than Lot and his family, there were no survivors with God’s judgment against Sodom and Gomorrah. And here, so again, this language connects verse 10 with its previous context. And the Lord says what? He says, hear.

He says, give ear. Now where have we heard this language before? Well we heard it back in verse two. In verse two, the Lord addresses not his people directly, he addresses the entire cosmos, the entire creation. He opens up his prophecy by saying, hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth, why? For the Lord, Yahweh, has spoken. In verse two, Yahweh calls upon the entire cosmos to bear faithful testimony to his covenant indictment against his unfaithful people. But here in verse 10, he addresses his people directly. He addresses both their rulers and the people themselves. He says, hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom. Give ear to the teaching of our God, you people of Gomorrah. So leaders and people alike are addressed by the Lord. And they are addressed shockingly as Sodom and Gomorrah.

Why is God doing this? This is intentionally shocking language. The point that the Lord is making here is that the faithlessness of the people is so shocking and so horrific in the eyes of God that it is compared to the ancient cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, cities which came to exemplify the utter depths of sin and degeneracy and human depravity. And he says, hear the word of the Lord, give ear to the teaching of our God. This is how he begins this section of Isaiah chapter one. It’s also similarly how he ends the section. If you look at verse 20, what does it say? But if you refuse and rebel, you shall be eaten by the sword. For what? For the mouth of the Lord has spoken. So at the beginning of this section, he says, hear the word of the Lord, give ear to the teaching of our God.

At the end of this section, he says, the mouth of the Lord has spoken. Again, what does this teach us? This teaches us that God is speaking. This is not Isaiah’s ideas that he’s sharing with the people. He is bringing to them an authoritative word from Yahweh, their God, the true and living God. This passage is bookended with reminders that the message here is God’s revelation. Ultimately, it is not Isaiah’s word, but the word of Yahweh, Israel’s faithful covenant keeping God and gracious Redeemer. And that word, hear, he’s like, listen up, hear. What’s the significance of that word? What does it mean to hear? Well, pastor means to do what I’m doing now. I hear you. I hear the sound waves going through the air and they enter my eardrums and I hear that you’re speaking.

But is that the significance of this term here? Well, friends, Dr. E.J. Young in his commentary puts it well. He says, the imperative, the imperative here implies more than mere physical, the mere physical act of hearing. It implies a hearing that results in obedience to the thing heard. One does not truly hear God’s word unless he obeys that word. There’s a sense in which if you hear the word of God and don’t do what it says, there’s a sense in which you haven’t really heard it. To hear God’s word is to not only take it in but to work it out in your day-to-day life. This reminds me of a comment that is made in a passage in the book of James. If you turn to James chapter 1, look at James 1 verses 22 to 25.

James chapter 1 verses 22 through 25. James, the brother of our Lord writes, but be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror, for he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. That’s sort of like me in the morning before I’ve had my morning coffee. I look at myself in the mirror and then I was like, what do I, yeah. Then I look again and I’m like, wow, I really need to do some work there. Being a hearer only but not a doer is like looking at yourself in the mirror and forgetting what you were like, verse 25.

But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing. So Isaiah, or I should say the Holy Spirit through Isaiah, is calling the people to not only hear him, to hear his complaint, but to act appropriately based upon what they hear, to assimilate what they are hearing and to take it to heart and to make the needed changes in their lives. In verse 11, he goes on to say, and here’s the Lord speaking, he says, what to me is the multitude of your sacrifices, says the Lord. I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of well-fed beasts. I do not delight in the blood of bulls or of lambs or of goats.

Here the Lord begins to lay out his complaint against the people. He goes so far, and again, there’s anthropomorphic, God is speaking here as if he’s a man. He’s speaking in a way that we as human beings will understand. He’s basically saying, I’m fed up with you guys. I’ve had enough, enough already. He says, what to me is the multitude of your sacrifices? He says, I do not delight in the blood of bulls. One commentator points out in terms of the Lord saying, I do not delight in your sacrifices. He says, the Lord’s distaste for sacrifices offered by those who do evil is expressed with increasing sharpness. In verse 13, he says, I cannot endure. In verse 14, he ratchets it up a bit and he says, my soul hates. This is strong language that the Lord is using.

The Lord is obviously deeply offended with his people. Is he offended because they’re offering so many animal sacrifices? Is Isaiah here standing against what other parts of the scripture require of God’s people in terms of the ceremonial laws and the sacrificial laws? Well, no, friends. See, in this passage, Isaiah is not denying that the Lord had appointed such sacrificial worship in the law of Moses. Indeed, friends, if you’re a Bible reader, you know that there are large sections of the Old Testament law of Moses where God gave his people under the Old Covenant directions for offering just these kinds of sacrifices. In fact, the Book of Leviticus is almost an entire book devoted to these kinds of ceremonial and sacrificial matters. I remember the first time I tried to read through the Bible in its entirety, and Genesis and Exodus, they were fine, but when I hit the Book of Leviticus, that was like hitting a wall.

It’s like all these details, these gory details about how you were to offer the sin offering, the burnt offering, the peace offerings, and so forth. So God obviously required these offerings of his people under the Old Covenant. So it wasn’t the sacrifices themselves that the Lord had an issue with. Instead, from the context here, we see that what the Lord found so objectionable was not the sacrifices themselves, but rather the sinful, rebellious mindset and the unbelieving, unrepentant attitude of the people by which they offered their sacrifices. Their acts of worship and sacrifice were apparently a mere going through the motions, a mere ritualism, a formalistic, hypocritical exercise that dishonored their God and ultimately did them no good. They were going through the motions. They were very meticulous and careful to offer the sacrifices as prescribed, but they were not giving their hearts to the Lord in an attitude of repentance and faith.

And so their worship is judged to be vain worship. There also may be hints in this passage that the people of Judah and Jerusalem had perhaps adopted a pagan mindset in bringing their worship and sacrifices to the Lord. Perhaps they were thinking that Yahweh actually depended upon them for his sustenance, for his nourishment, or perhaps they thought that the multitude of their sacrifices and the wordiness of their prayers would somehow get God on their side and would enable them to manipulate God and control God. This was a very common mindset among Israel’s ancient Gentile neighbors. The pagan Gentiles who lived around Israel, how did they approach their gods? Well, in their polytheistic theology, their gods actually depended for their food upon the sacrifices of their worshippers. And if you believed this, if you had this worldview, you didn’t want the gods or goddesses to get upset with you because they might get hangry, you know?

You know what it is to be hangry? You’re hungry. And because you’re hungry, you get angry. And the worry and the concern was that, well, if we don’t appease the gods, if we don’t offer them adequate sacrifices and don’t give them their food, they’re going to get hungry and they’re going to get mad at us and they’re going to stomp on us, right? So we’ve got to keep the gods well fed, right? And perhaps the Israelites had begun to approach God with this mindset and view God this way, the true God, in their sacrifices. Of course, the reason that God appointed the animal sacrifices under the Old Covenant was not because God needed to be fed, but rather because those sacrifices were intended to point forward to Christ, the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world.

In any case, friends, the Lord describes their worship as a trampling of my courts. When we come before God in worship, we come before a king. And the picture is of a king’s court. But we come before him with vain worship. When we do so, we desecrate, we trample, we profane the courts of the Lord when we offer vain offerings. And then if you read on, as we read on in verses 12 and 13, it says, When you come to appear before me, who has required of you this trampling of my courts? He doesn’t say who has required these sacrifices of you. The Lord himself had required these sacrifices. But it is the trampling of his courts that he has not required. He’s expecting them to come not just with appropriately offered sacrifices, but with a heart that is right with the Lord.

Bring no more. And he actually goes on to say, the Lord says, bring no more vain offerings. Incense is an abomination to me. New moon and Sabbath and the calling of convocations. And then really the rub of the issue here is at the end of verse 13. I cannot endure iniquity and solemn assembly. The big problem seems to have been that while the people were hyper scrupulous when it came to observing their solemn assemblies, hyper scrupulous about making sure that they fulfilled all the requirements of the ritual and ceremony of the old covenant law. At the same time, they were guilty of gross sins, sins of social injustice, sins described not only as iniquity, but notice verse 15. What does God say? He says of the Israelites who are offering, you know, lifting up their hands in prayer thinking that God hears them.

What does he say? He says, your hands are full of blood. Not only are your hands stained with blood, it’s as if they’ve dipped their hands in a bowl of blood. Their hands are dripping with blood. This I believe indicates bloodshed, murder, social injustice. They were oppressing and doing violent acts of injustice against their fellow Israelites. So the point is, while they were hyper scrupulous to observe the ceremonies of the law, they seem to have no scruples and no repentance about their own gross sins. They were scrupulous to perform the rituals of the law correctly, but they had no scruples about their sin. Ritual scruples, absolutely. Moral scruples, no way. What do we learn from this? There’s many things we learn, beloved, but I would suggest to you first of all that in passages like this one, we see the offensiveness as well as the dangers of a merely outward religion, a merely external ritualism and formalism in our approach to Almighty God.

Now some might say, well, Pastor, look, we’re Presbyterian, right? Do all things decently and in good order. That’s our Presbyterian cry, right? And we believe that. The Bible says God is a God of order. He’s not a God of chaos. And we want to offer God well-ordered worship. That is a legitimate concern. So yes, it is true that in worship we should seek to do everything decently and in good order. And observing the so-called regulative principle of worship is also important, for we should only worship God in the way that he has prescribed and revealed in the Holy Scriptures. That’s what the regulative principle means. It means that every act and element of our worship needs to be warranted by the word of God. We need to worship God according to his requirements, not according to our imaginations.

And that’s why we don’t do things like wave banners in acts of worship or have liturgical dancing and so forth, because we’re seeking to do what God tells us to do in our acts of worship. But the point here, friends, is that if we do everything correctly on the outside, if we have a well-ordered worship service and we observe all of the biblical elements of worship, like the singing of praises, the offering of prayers, the preaching and reading of the word and so forth, we can do all of those things correctly on the outside. But if we neglect to give the Lord our heart devotion in worship, if we’re just going through the motions, then we are in fact offering vain worship to the Lord. Vain worship, which is no better than idolatry, and we are in fact trampling the courts of the Lord.

As one commentator puts it, it is ritual divorced from penitence or repentance that God hates. Scripture tells us that God will not despise a broken and a contrite heart. Beloved, if you approach God in worship with a heart that is repentant over your sin, if you say, Lord, I struggle with my sin, Lord. If you come with that heart and you come looking to Christ and Christ alone for your salvation from sin, then the good news is that in union with Christ, your worship, imperfect though it may be, your worship is still acceptable to God because it is brought through Christ, through his merit and mediation, and it is brought from a heart that is humble and contrite. But of course, only a heart that has been renewed and born again by the Holy Spirit is capable of offering such acceptable worship unto the Lord.

Dear listener, has your heart been renewed by the Spirit of God? Have you come by the grace of God to see your sin, your need for a Savior? Have you come to embrace the Lord Jesus Christ as your very own Lord and Savior, the Christ who was crucified for the forgiveness of sins and raised from the dead so that all who believe in him might not perish but have everlasting life? This kind of heart worship is described by the Lord Jesus in his conversation with that deeply sinful woman whom he nevertheless showed amazing grace to. In John chapter 4, the Samaritan woman, the Lord Jesus says this to her, and this is a passage that would take a long time to explain, but I just want to read this to you. John 4, verses 21 to 24, as the Lord Jesus is speaking to the woman at the well, the Samaritan woman, he says, In Jerusalem will you worship the Father, you, that is you Samaritans, worship what you do not know, we, we Jews, worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews.

But the hour is coming and is now here when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth. The only way to worship the Lord in spirit and in truth is if you are renewed and indwelt by the spirit of God and enjoy new life in union with Christ. Come to Jesus today, believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ, the word says, and you will be saved. And that brings me to my next point as we move along in this passage. Here next, a call to repentance and reformation. In verse 16, the Lord says, Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean, remove the evil of your deeds from before my eyes, cease to do evil, learn to do good, seek justice, correct oppression, bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow’s cause.

He says, Wash yourselves, remove the evil of your deeds. Yahweh, friends, Yahweh had brought his covenant lawsuit against the people. He had laid before them his complaint against their faithless, vain worship. But here in this section of our passage, he calls upon them in this language here to repent of their sins, to reform their lives, and to bear the fruits of repentance by doing those works which are in keeping with true faith, repentance, and reformation of life. Isaiah is not preaching here a works righteousness theology. He’s not preaching salvation by works, but he’s saying, look, your repentance ought to be such that it bears fruit, the fruits of repentance. Here we see that God expects genuine repentance to lead to godly action, to what our confessional standards call a walking after a new obedience. Dear Christian, let me ask you, you claim to be repentant, praise God if you are.

We are all called to live a life. The Christian life is a life of ongoing daily repentance and renewed faith, but that repentance ought to bear fruit. It bears fruit in the pursuit of godliness, in the pursuit of holiness. Are you walking after a new obedience? Are you pursuing godliness, holiness? I’m reminded of, again, James is a wonderful section of scripture to read alongside of sections of Isaiah like this, and I’m reminded of what James writes in chapter four, verses four through ten. As James is addressing some worldly minded Christians, he says this, you adulterous people, do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you suppose that it is to no purpose that the scripture says he yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us?

But he gives more grace, there’s good news there, he gives more grace. Therefore it says, God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep, he’s calling them to a godly sorrow for sin. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and here’s the good news, and he will exalt you. Humble yourselves before the Lord and he will exalt you. But of course, we know beloved that all of this, that the Lord is calling his people to this repentance and the bearing of the fruit of repentance.

This is impossible apart from the grace of God our Father, apart from the blood of Jesus Christ our Savior, and apart from the renewing and sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit. And that’s why Dr. E.J. Young reminds us in these words as he comments on this passage. The verse contained four imperatives uttered with absolute authority, wash, make you clean, put away, cease. Why are these commands given if the men of Judah did not have within themselves the power to obey them? The answer is that they serve to bring men to a conviction of their need for washing and cleansing. Like men of today, the inhabitants of Judah thought that they had no such need. They brought sacrifices. Is that not satisfactory? These commands also serve to convince men of their inability to obey. See the law of God shows us that we can’t keep it.

We don’t have the power or strength within ourselves to keep it. What man in his own strength has ever been able to wash and to cleanse himself from the stain of sin? They also, these commands also serve the purpose of causing a man to seek after the true and proper source of cleansing, even the grace of God himself. The point is that yes, the Lord through Isaiah lays before the people high and lofty demands that they cleanse themselves, that they cease to do evil and learn to do good and so forth, commands that they cannot keep in their own strength or power. But the point is that the law shows us our sin and our desperate need for a savior. In terms of what they needed to do, in terms of the scope of their sin, there’s mention here in verse 17 of the fatherless and the widow.

The fatherless and the widow represented the most powerless, weak, and vulnerable in society. We learn in the scriptures that God has a special place in his heart for those who are weak and oppressed. To pretend to bring worship to the Lord while neglecting the needs of the weak and vulnerable and especially while being actively engaged in oppressing the weak and the vulnerable is the height of arrogance. It is a taking of the Lord’s name in vain and deeply offensive to our holy God. And so what is the conclusion of our passage? The conclusion is found in verses 18 through 20. We find in this passage a promise and a warning. This is the last point in your sermon outline, a promise and a warning. Eat or be eaten. Eat or be eaten. Look at verses 18 and 20.

The Lord says, come now, let us reason together, says the Lord. Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool. If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land. But if you refuse and rebel, you shall be eaten by the sword. And then to add a solemn, to close this section of chapter one with a solemn note, it says for the mouth of the Lord has spoken. In other words, this is God’s sure and certain word. You can bank on it. In verse 18, we see that the Lord had confronted his people with their sins and he had called them to repent and to reform. But here the Lord in verse 18 speaks tenderly to his faithless people, promising them forgiveness and cleansing.

Sometimes in the Bible, God speaks very sharply, even almost harshly. Jesus himself sometimes used harsh language when he confronted the religious hypocrites and the religious leaders, the self-assured of his day. The reason that he called them whitewashed tombs and serpents, was he speaking out of hatred? No. These were people who were settled in their self-righteousness and they needed to be unsettled. They needed to be shaken up. When the Lord speaks a sharp word, he speaks it out of love. And so God speaks, he thunders his law to wake us up from our spiritual stupor. And then once we are awakened and once we are terrified by the threats of the law, he comes in mercy to us through the gospel and he speaks tenderly to us. And that’s what the Lord is doing here in verse 18.

He had thundered at them with the demands of his law, but now he speaks tenderly to them with gospel, with good news. And he tells them that in spite of their vain worship, in spite of their external ritualism and formalism, in spite of their trampling of his courts and their violent murderous social injustices toward one another, there was still hope for them. He says, come and let us reason together. This is possibly legal terminology, though it is questionable that we are to understand this as a legal setting. God is not bringing further charges against his people to condemn them, but he’s inviting them to receive his mercy. As Dr. Young writes, there is a gracious condescension in the language and Isaiah, who has been commanding repentance, shows himself as a prophet of grace. But there is responsibility laid upon the Israelites, upon the Judahites.

He says in verse 19, if you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land. If you are willing and obedient, this appears to be Isaiah’s way of issuing the gospel call of saying, repent and believe the good news. If they were to return to Yahweh in true faith and repentance, they shall eat the good of the land. What land is he speaking of? He’s speaking of the Holy Land, the promised land. And what is significant about that, brothers and sisters, the promised land, the land where the city of Israel was the capital and where the temple of the Lord was, that land was a type, a picture of the ultimate promised land, the new heavens and the new earth where in righteousness dwells. So not only is he promising that, look, if you reform your ways and return to me in faith and repentance, well, then you’ll get to stay in the land and everything’s going to be okay.

You’ll be able to have the harvest of your land and so forth. That was part of the covenantal arrangement that God made with his people under the Old Covenant. But beyond that earthly type was the heavenly prototype. And so eating the good of the land is a type, a picture of receiving and benefiting from the gift of life everlasting. If they return to the Lord in true penitent faith, then they would eat in the sense of receive and enjoy the blessings of life in the Holy Land. That means life eternal. But what happens if they don’t repent and believe? Verse 20, if you refuse and rebel, if you dig your heels in, if you continue to harden your heart, what’s going to happen if you refuse and rebel? You shall be eaten by the sword.

In other words, you will be destroyed. The sword represents judgment. And of course, that sadly came upon the people of Judah as they persisted in their idolatry and covenant breaking. Ultimately they were exiled by the Babylonians. But ultimately this speaks of a final judgment, a final destruction. And then, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken. So there’s a promise, but there’s also a warning. And this promise and warning is similar to the promise and warning that we read of, and I close my sermon with this passage in John chapter 3, verses 16 to 21. You know John 3, 16, for God so loved the world that He gave His only Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. We love that verse, but we need to read on. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through Him, whoever believes in Him is not condemned.

There’s the promise. But whoever does not believe is condemned already because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. There’s the warning. And this is the judgment. The light has come into the world and the people loved darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light lest his works should be exposed. But whoever does what is true comes to the light so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God. By the grace of God, may we all come to the light by believing in Christ, in Christ alone, for salvation from sin. Then, by the grace of God, we will eat the good of the land, enjoying life eternal.

Amen. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, Sovereign God, we thank You for Your Word of Law and Your Word of Grace. We thank You for speaking a word of judgment to humble us, but also speaking a word of grace in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And we pray that You would give us the grace to respond to the Word with true faith and repentance. And may we walk after a new obedience out of gratitude for Your amazing gift of salvation to us in Jesus. In His name we pray, in all of God’s people said, Amen. Let’s rise and sing as our hymn of commitment, number 502, All for Jesus. 500 and 2.

The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.

June 2, 2024
Revelation, Rebellion, Ruin, and a Remnant

About this sermon

1. The revelation of Yahweh’s covenant indictment (vv. 1-2).
2. The rebellion of God’s covenant people (vv. 2b-4).
3. The ruin of the rebellious (vv. 5-9).
4. A faithful remnant preserved by grace (v. 9).

More sermons from Isaiah · Browse all sermons

Sermon transcript

Please remain standing for the reading of God’s word. This morning I begin a new sermon series in the book of the prophet Isaiah. The sermon series is going to be entitled Gleanings in Isaiah. We’re not going to go verse by verse through this entire book of Isaiah. It is not my intention to begin a decade long sermon series, which is what I would have to do if we covered every last verse of this wonderful portion of God’s word, but we are going to be considering various portions of Isaiah, and this is a wonderful rich portion of God’s word, and today we begin in Isaiah chapter 1 verses 1 through 9. You’ll find that in your Pew Bibles on page 672, Isaiah chapter 1 verses 1 through 9. Dear friends, this is the word of God.

Hear it with reverence and awe. The vision of Isaiah, the son of Amos, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah. Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth, for the Lord has spoken. Children have I reared and brought up, but they have rebelled against me. The ox knows its owner and the donkey its master’s crib, but Israel does not know. My people do not understand. Ah sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, offspring of evildoers, children who deal corruptly. They have forsaken the Lord. They have despised the Holy One of Israel. They are utterly estranged. Why will you still be struck down? Why will you continue to rebel? The whole head is sick and the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot even to the head there is no soundness in it, but bruises and sores and raw wounds.

They are not pressed out or bound up or softened with oil. Your country lies desolate. Your cities are burned with fire. In your very presence foreigners devour your land. It is desolate as overthrown by foreigners, and the daughter of Zion is left like a booth in a vineyard, like a lodge in a cucumber field, like a besieged city. If the Lord of hosts had not left us a few survivors, we should have been like Sodom and become like Gomorrah. Dear friends, the grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever. Let’s pray for the Lord to bless the preaching of his word. O gracious Lord and Father in heaven, you are indeed the holy one of Israel. You are the thrice holy God. We pray, Lord, that as we approach this text of your God-breathed, inerrant, infallible, authoritative word, we pray that your Holy Spirit would open our minds and our hearts to behold wondrous things from your word.

Help us, Lord, to mine the rich treasure that is found for us here in this section of Isaiah, and we pray that by the illumination of your spirit, your word would find a lodging place in our souls and bear much spiritual fruit in our lives. And we ask, Lord, once again, that you would set a guard over my lips, that I, your unworthy servant, might declare that which is faithful and true to the word this day, for the edification of your people, the salvation of the lost and most important of all, for the glory and honor and praise of your holy name. We pray these things in Jesus’ name and all of God’s people’s said. Amen. Congregation, you may be seated. The title of my sermon today is Revelation, Rebellion, Ruin, and a Remnant. And there’s quite a number of key words that the children can be listening for today if you find that helpful to follow along in the sermon, in your sermon outline.

Well, friends, if you were to ask many folks today, what is the chief or central attribute of God, the chief or central character quality of God, I suspect that many folks, including many Christians, would answer that question by saying, well, of course, the love of God. What could be more central to God’s being, God’s character, God’s attributes than the attribute of love? Now, friends, certainly the scriptures indicate that God’s love is indeed a glorious and a central attribute of the divine nature, and we believers, we rejoice in God’s amazing love and grace that are given to us in our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. But, friends, based upon this opening section of the book of the prophet Isaiah, I suspect that if Isaiah were asked that question, that he would likely answer this question by saying not the love of God, although certainly Isaiah displays and reveals the love of God and speaks about it often in his book, but I suspect that Isaiah would say the holiness of God.

In verse four, the Lord, Yahweh, if you see the word Lord in all capital letters, that’s an indication to the English reader that the translators are translating the Hebrew word Yahweh, and Yahweh is God’s covenantal name. So in verse four, the Lord, Yahweh, Israel’s faithful covenant-making, covenant-keeping God and gracious Redeemer is described as the Holy One of Israel, the Holy One of Israel. This is a title for God that occurs some 25 or 26 times in the book of Isaiah, but it only occurs about six other times in the rest of the Old Testament scriptures, which seems to show, friends, that Isaiah had a deep and profound sense of the transcendent, majestic, lofty holiness of God. God’s holiness is his transcendent set-apartness. He is set-apart, he is distinct from, he is distinct from the transcendent set-apartness.

He is set-apart, he is distinct from, he’s different from us. As God says later on in Isaiah, my ways are not your ways, my thoughts are not your thoughts. As high as the heavens are above the earth, so great are his thoughts above our thoughts and so forth. Friends, in this opening section of Isaiah, the prophet declares Yahweh’s covenant indictment against his sinful people, a people who have forsaken the Lord and as a result have begun to feel in their nation and in the life of their nation the ruinous effects of their impenitence, unfaithfulness, and covenant-breaking. You see, in contrast to the lofty, majestic, transcendent holiness of the God who is the Holy One of Israel, who is the Holy One of Israel, in contrast to that stands the utter unholiness and corruption of his rebellious, sinful people, a people whom Yahweh in this passage charges with having forsaken the Lord and having despised the Holy One of Israel, as we’re told in verse 4.

In this opening passage, the prophet Isaiah in effect serves the Lord as his prosecuting attorney against the people of Israel. That was often a function of the prophets in the Bible. They served as God’s prosecuting attorneys to charge his people with their covenant-breaking and to call them back to repentance and faith, to call them back into a faithful communion with their faithful covenant-making God. And this passage, therefore, serves in effect as Yahweh’s covenant indictment and lawsuit against his guilty and rebellious people, a people who so richly deserve the Lord’s judgment. And so this is a judgment oracle. This passage pulsates with the Lord’s holy wrath and judgment against his sinful people. And yet, and yet, beloved, even in the midst of this opening passage of prophetic judgment, a passage which reveals and displays the white-hot holiness of God and which condemns the unholiness of the people, even in this passage, there are hints of grace.

There are hints of a future restoration. You say, where are the hints? Well, the very first hint is the prophet’s name itself. Children, do you know what the name Isaiah means? And if you’re children, you better take, I want you to take notes because I want your parents to ask you this later on. What does the name Isaiah mean? The name Isaiah means the Lord saves. Yahweh saves. Isaiah, Yahweh saves. And then another note of hope is found in verse 9. In verse 9, it indicates that Yahweh, in sovereign grace and mercy, has preserved an elect remnant of the faithful. See, even in wrath, the Lord remembers mercy. So as we embark upon our exploration of this glorious portion of God’s word, it’s important for us to understand the historical context into which Isaiah speaks the word of the Lord.

The details of verse 1 indicate that Isaiah was a prophet to the southern kingdom of Judah. Let me again read verse 1. It says, the vision of Isaiah, the son of Amos, that’s not the same as the prophet Amos. That’s another individual. Isaiah is the son of Amos, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. In the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah. Now the geographical details that are mentioned in this verse, namely the region of Judah and its capital city, the city of Jerusalem, along with the Davidic kings that are mentioned in this verse, firmly situate Isaiah’s prophetic ministry in the southern kingdom. Remember at that time in covenant history, the people of God were divided into, the kingdom was divided. So there were the northern tribes, the northern kingdom, which was typically called Samaria, and then there was the southern kingdom, the kingdom of Judah, with the temple there in Judah, at Jerusalem, in the capital city, and with the kings who were descendants of David.

And so this passage firmly situates Isaiah’s prophetic ministry in the southern kingdom. The fact that Isaiah’s visions are recorded in this book cover a period of these four kings of Judah. That fact indicates that Isaiah had a very lengthy ministry as a prophet of the Lord. Dr. Derek Kidner in his commentary points out that the list of kings indicates that he prophesied for at least 40 years, from about 740 B.C., which was the last year of King Uzziah, until some point after the Jerusalem siege of 701 in the time of Hezekiah, whose reign continued to about 687 or 686 B.C. So friends, with this information in mind, let’s hone our attention into the text that we have before us today. And the first thing I want to direct your attention to are the first two verses, as we notice here the revelation of Yahweh’s covenant indictment.

That’s the first point in your sermon outline, the revelation of Yahweh’s covenant indictment. Again, let me read these verses. The vision of Isaiah the son of Amos, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah. Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth, for the Lord has spoken. Children have I reared and brought up, but they have rebelled against me. How does Isaiah describe his writing, what he is recording here? It is described as a vision. Now the term vision is a term that often refers to a particular mode by which God reveals his word. Oftentimes in the scriptures God revealed his word to his prophets through dreams or visions and so forth. But it seems that at this point the term vision took on a more generic meaning and indicated divine revelation in general, not just a particular mode by which that revelation came.

So the point here, beloved, in the very first verse, in this opening verse right out of the gates, this verse which likely is intended as an introduction to the entire book of Isaiah and not merely to this opening section of Isaiah, here in this opening verse the prophet claims divine authority and inspiration for his message. And that ought to affect or impact the way that we read this. Isaiah is not just jotting down his own personal thoughts or ideas or reflections. Isaiah is recording the word of the Lord. Now even though Isaiah, as the human author, he has his own peculiar writing style, a writing style that distinguishes him from the other writing prophets of the Bible, like Jeremiah and Ezekiel, both of which have their own peculiar writing styles. But nevertheless, though Isaiah is the human author of the book that bears his name, nevertheless, as a divinely called and inspired prophet of God, his message ultimately comes from God.

In other words, the book of Isaiah is not ultimately Isaiah’s message. Rather, we need to remember that this is God’s message. This is God’s word. And like all true prophets, Isaiah is God’s divinely inspired messenger. A prophet was a mouthpiece of God. A prophet was one whom God had called to declare his word, to give new and fresh divine revelation to the people of God. And Isaiah was just such a man with just such a calling. But who is Isaiah addressing? To whom are his prophecies relevant in terms of to whom they are directly addressed? Now all of the Bible is for all of God’s people. This entire book is the word of God. It’s the only infallible rule of faith and practice. So all of God’s word is written for us, but not all of God’s word is written directly to us.

Isaiah addresses matters concerning what? Concerning Judah and Jerusalem. And again, this identifies Isaiah, as I mentioned, as a prophet to the southern kingdom, the Davidic kingdom of Judah. Jerusalem, of course, was the capital of Judah. And not only that, more significantly, Jerusalem was the holy city, the city where God’s temple was. The temple being a symbol of God’s presence with and reign over his covenant people. And he writes this, he records this prophecy in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah. His prophetic utterances that are recorded in this book cover the period of these four kings. Again, the kings of Judah who are mentioned here helped to situate Isaiah’s ministry within the covenant history of God’s people. It is clear that Isaiah’s ministry as a prophet of God was quite lengthy as he carried out his ministry under the reigns of four kings.

And he was faithful in that ministry for all that time. And how does he start off this covenant indictment that the Lord calls him to bring against the Lord’s unfaithful people? It says this in verse 2, What are we to make of the Lord’s address to the heavens and the earth? Why this language? Why this cosmic language? Well, God, as he brings his indictment against his covenant-breaking people, he calls for witnesses. And the witnesses he calls are the entire creation, the entire cosmos. The whole creation is called upon to bear faithful witness to the truthfulness of Yahweh’s covenant indictment against his sinful people. This cosmic language hearkens back to the words of Moses that I read for you earlier in the service, back to Deuteronomy 30, verse 19. Let’s go back to that verse very briefly.

Deuteronomy chapter 30, verse 19. Where we read these words, as Moses confronts the people of Israel and as they’re preparing to go in and take the promised land and he confronts them with the choice of either life or death, he says this, I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life that you and your offspring may live. Since God’s professing people in Isaiah’s day had sadly chosen death and chosen the curse due to their persistent impenitence and unbelief and idolatry, the cosmos is again called upon, this time by Isaiah the prophet, to bear faithful witness against the Lord’s unfaithful people. And then, what do we have here? As God summons the heavens and the earth, summons all of creation to bear witness to the truthfulness of his covenant indictment against his people, what does he say?

He says, for the Lord, for Yahweh has spoken. The Lord has spoken. This language again underscores that this is the sure and certain word of God. It is not the fallible and untrustworthy words of man. So right out of the gate, in the opening section of Isaiah, which introduces the whole book of Isaiah, right out of the gate, Isaiah claims divine authority. He claims to be bringing the very word of God to the people of God. Now what do we learn from these opening verses? There’s a couple of points of application I’d like to make. First of all, beloved, we learn from passages like this that the true and living God is not a mute deity. Many people today who claim they believe in God, they want a God who is silent, a God who will not speak into their lives and tell them what is right and wrong and tell them what they must do to live for him and what they must do to be saved.

They want to invent their own religion, and so they want a mute deity. But the God of the Bible, the true and living God, he is not a silent being. No, my friends. The Bible reveals a God who actually speaks, a God who desires to communicate and in fact has communicated with his people. For the believer, that is a great comfort, because brothers and sisters in Christ, God has spoken a sure and certain word to us. And in the gospel, he speaks a sure and certain word of grace and salvation, and we can stake our lives and eternity upon that word. God has communicated, the Lord has spoken, and he has done so in his word. Praise God that the Lord, Yahweh, the faithful covenant redeemer God, has spoken. And praise God that he has blessed us with access to his word.

Let me just, as an aside, brothers and sisters, have you ever considered just how incredibly privileged you and I are? We are so incredibly privileged because we all have our own copies of this book. We all have our own copies of the word of God. For most of redemptive history and most of church history, most of God’s people could not afford to have their own copy of the Bible. If you were a Christian living in the days of the early apostolic church, you couldn’t afford, unless you were very wealthy, you couldn’t afford to have your own copy of the word of God. You would have to go to the synagogue or after the resurrection of Christ and the pouring out of the Spirit on Pentecost, you would depend on the apostles and the preachers of the early church to proclaim and to read the word publicly and proclaim the word.

And that’s a wonderful thing. It is a wonderful thing to come and hear the word of God as it is read publicly and as it is proclaimed publicly. But we have the gift of the inscriptuated word. We no longer have to rely upon just hearing it orally and with our ears. We can read it with our very own eyes. That is a great and tremendous privilege. But remember, brothers and sisters, with greater privileges come greater responsibilities. And we have no excuse for not knowing the word and being into the word. So praise God. He is not silent. He has spoken. Another truth that we can glean from these opening verses is that our rebellion and unbelief are not hidden from the Lord. He knows all. He sees all as the omniscient one, the all-knowing one.

He sees our sins. And there’s a sense in which all of creation bears faithful witness against our unfaithfulness, just as it does here to Isaiah’s contemporaries as the Lord brings this covenant lawsuit against them for their covenant breaking. Friends, let us not continue to walk in folly and unbelief. Instead, let us turn to the Lord in repentance and take refuge in the mercy that he freely offers to us in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We, too, have been unfaithful. We, too, in our sin have rebelled against the Lord. We, too, are deserving of the Lord to have the Lord bring His indictment against us. But praise God, Jesus, our Savior, took that curse upon Himself. He died in our place, in our stead, as our sin bearer, as our substitute. And so we have hope.

And so we see here God’s revelation. But next, notice what we learn here about the rebellion of God’s covenant people as we consider verses two through four. Let’s consider next the rebellion of God’s covenant people. And how does God describe His covenant people in verse two? He says, children have I reared and brought up. Children, I believe in the Hebrew that word is emphatic. Children have I reared and brought up. But they, shockingly, horrifically, they have rebelled against me. Though they are my children, though I have reared and brought them up. What is that referring to? Probably what Isaiah has in the background of his thinking as he conveys the Lord’s message to the people, where it refers to the Lord rearing and bringing up the children of Israel. That probably has in view the fact that God had redeemed them from slavery in Egypt, had brought them miraculously out of Egypt, brought them through the Red Sea on dry land, given them His holy law, His Torah, His covenant instruction from Mount Sinai, and had planted them in the promised land.

And not only had He planted them in the promised land, He had pitched His tent among them. He had come to dwell in their midst. God had done all of this for the children of Israel. He had redeemed them. He had brought them up. He had reared them. But in spite of all that He’s done for them, what do they do? They rebel against Him. Now this language serves to highlight the shocking, unspeakable nature of Israel’s rebellion. It was not mere slaves or servants of the Lord who had rebelled against Him, but rather it was those whom He had taken into His divine household as redeemed children. In spite of all God had done for them, they had rebelled. In spite of God’s grace in rearing and bringing them up as His children, they had the arrogance and the audacity to rebel against Him, the very One who is their holy Creator and gracious Redeemer.

Now what does He mean when He charges them with having rebelled against Him? In what way had they rebelled? Well, the particular nature of this rebellion is not explicitly stated in this verse, but as we read on in Isaiah, we infer from the rest of Isaiah that the people had rebelled against the Lord, that this rebellion included such things as idolatry, idol worship, and syncretism, mixing the true religion, mixing the worship of the true God with the pagan gods of Israel’s gentile neighbors. It also included rebellions such as social injustice and oppression. The Israelites were oppressing one another. It includes, overall, a disobedience to God’s law and a lack of trust in the Lord. And then he goes on to say in verse 3, The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master’s crib.

But Israel does not know, my people do not understand. They are willfully ignorant. They do not understand at a spiritual level. Here Isaiah uses illustrations from the animal world to contrast God’s rebellious children with beasts of burden, which are compliant and content, at least for the most part, and in comparison to the children of Israel. Beasts of burden, as long as you treat them well, as long as you feed them and house them and provide for their basic needs, they’ll do what you direct them to do. But God’s children, who ought to have known better, they rebel. Dr. G. W. Grogan in his commentary says, Here nature serves the purposes of prophecy. The heavens and earth witness God’s complaint against his people, and the ox and donkey dumbly, or without words, rebuke Israel’s ingratitude. What is it referring to when it talks about the donkey knowing its master’s crib?

Well, that is a language that indicates a feeding trough. And so basically what this is saying is that Israel does not submit to Yahweh’s lordship, nor do they find spiritual sustenance in him, for they go after other gods. So do you see the contrast here in these verses? God’s children, on the one hand, God’s children, think of it, they rebel, but speechless animals comply. How pathetic, how tragic. And then verse 4, God brings his charge into further focus when he says, Ah, sinful nation, a people laden or burdened, weighed down with iniquity, offspring of evildoers, children who deal corruptly, they have forsaken the Lord, they have despised the Holy One of Israel, they are utterly estranged. Do you notice in this verse Isaiah uses a rich array of language to describe the rebellion of the people.

Their rebellion is described as sinful, as iniquity, they are described as evildoers, guilty of corruption, and so forth. Dear ones, we learn from this and other scriptures like it that we have all sinned and fall short of the glory of God, as we’re told in Romans chapter 3, verse 23. We have all rebelled against God by breaking his holy laws and by giving our ultimate allegiance to idols, even idols that we’ve erected in our own hearts. Only through Christ and by faith in him can we be forgiven and restored into a right relationship with God. Have you turned to Christ? Is he your Savior, your Lord? But does this rebellion, does it impact the people negatively? It sure does. Next Isaiah describes the ruin of the rebellious, the ruin of the rebellious as we consider verses 5 through 9.

And in verse 5, Isaiah says, or the Holy Spirit through Isaiah says, why will you still be struck down? Why will you continue to rebel? Why are you digging in your heels when such ruin has come upon you? And then he describes this ruin. He says, the whole head is sick and the whole heart faint from the sole of the foot, even to the head there is no soundness in it, but bruises and sores and raw wounds. Do you get the picture here? They’re not in a good way. They are not pressed out or bound up or softened with oil. Here is a figurative description of the ruinous condition of God’s rebellious nation, his rebellious people. Dr. Derek Kidner explains that the picture is not of a sick man, but of someone flogged within an inch of his life yet asking for more.

What does this highlight? This highlights, beloved, the utter irrationality of unrepentant rebellion against the Lord. That’s what’s being highlighted here. And then verse 7, he goes on to say, again, as he continues to bring their situation into focus, he says, your country lies desolate. Your cities are burned with fire. In your very presence foreigners devour your land. In other words, there’s been foreign invasion and it’s been destructive, it’s been desolating. Foreigners devour your land. It is desolate as overthrown by foreigners. And the daughter of Zion is left like a booth in a vineyard, like a lodge in a cucumber field, like a besieged city. You’ve been humbled. The nation has been humbled and desolated and bereft of its former glory. Now in verse 7, in this verse, the figurative language of the preceding verses gives way to a more literal assessment of Judah’s current condition as a nation.

In terms of the particular historical circumstances, the particular foreign invasion, that is that Isaiah may be referring to, scholars have often have offered various possibilities, but one possibility that is quite possible, that’s kind of being repetitive there, one possibility that is very likely, I should say, is that this verse reflects the aftermath of Sennacherib’s invasion in 701 BC. But friends, whichever particular foreign invasion may be the backdrop of this passage, it’s clear what the result was. What was the result? What was the result of their rebellion? What did they gain by abandoning the Lord and going after other gods, by breaking his holy law, by living and hardening themselves in their impenitence and unbelief? What was the result? Were there any benefits that came from it? No, there was desolation. And that’s brought out in verse eight.

Now, what does he mean by the daughter of Zion? Well, this is a personification of Jerusalem. Jerusalem has been left weakened, deprived of its former glory. Again, to quote from Dr. Kidner, the booth is the field workers’ or watchman’s shanty, a forlorn relic of the harvest. That’s what Israel’s been left like. The mighty nation of Israel, the God’s people who during Solomon’s reign had been so prosperous and so wealthy and so strong in the League of Nations, now they are deprived. They are isolated. They are humbled. They are weakened. But they’re not yet destroyed. Look at verse nine. It says, If the Lord of hosts had not left us a few survivors, we should have been like Sodom and become like Gomorrah. So there is hope even in the midst of this desolation. But again, so much, so much for the former glory of Zion.

Now, what do we learn from this? As we wrap up our time in the Word, there is one more brief point I want to make, but one point of application I want to make. We learn from this, that sin, three words, write these words down, underline them, put exclamation points around behind them. Sin is stupid. Sin is stupid. Rebellion is irrational and ruinous, but as we will see, repentance leads to restoration. Again, Isaiah had asked in verse five, why will you still be struck down? Why will you continue to rebel? You’re not gaining anything by your rebellion. It’s irrational. It’s stupid. And it’s amazing to me how otherwise intelligent, rational people can become so irrational when it comes to their seeking of autonomy from God, their rebellion against the Lord. The lesson of this passage is that sin is stupid, rebellion is ruinous, but repentance leads to restoration.

Restoration, that brings me to my final point based on verse nine. We see here in this verse, a faithful remnant preserved by grace. A faithful remnant preserved by grace. It says, if the Lord of hosts had not left us a few survivors, we should have become like Sodom and become like Gomorrah. Now what is this title for God? Lord of hosts, what does that mean? Yahweh of hosts. Well, this is military language. This is military language. It’s military hosts. And so Lord of hosts has in view Yahweh, the Lord, as the divine warrior, the divine warrior who leads his hosts, whether angelic or human, into battle and on to victory. And why this comparison to Sodom and Gomorrah? Let me ask you this. Brothers and sisters, when the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, were there any survivors?

Was there any remnant left for Sodom and Gomorrah? The answer is no. But the Lord is leaving survivors for his people Israel because God is faithful to his covenant. Even though the Lord’s covenant indictment exposes the people as deserving of God’s judgment, we find here in the midst of this divine lawsuit against a rebellious people a note of hope and a hint of grace. After all, though the survivors will be few, there will at least be survivors. God will preserve for himself an elect remnant. And the Apostle Paul uses this language and he employs it in that famous discussion of his in Romans chapter 9 on the mystery of divine election and how the Lord promises to keep an elect remnant. Even in wrath, God remembers mercy. God’s grace shines through even in the midst of the most desperate, desolate of times, such as the times in which Isaiah lived.

And that should give us hope, brothers and sisters. The Lord is gracious. Here at the beginning of Isaiah, his grace and the hope of restoration, it’s like a little trickle. But by the time we reach the end of Isaiah, that trickle has become a great ocean of grace that flows out to all of the nations of humanity. And brothers and sisters and dear listeners, that grace flows out to you if by the grace of God you embrace and receive Christ as your very own Lord and Savior. May God give you the grace to trust in him today. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we praise you and thank you, O God, for your grace and goodness to us. Lord, we thank you for difficult and challenging passages like this one. For Lord, you speak these hard truths not because you wish to crush us or to wear us down, but because you desire to restore us.

And so we pray that in your grace we would be preserved and that we would be strengthened to follow you, the one who is the Holy One of Israel, the one who is Yahweh of hosts, the captain of our salvation. In Jesus’ name we pray, and all of God’s people said, Amen. As we close our time today, let’s rise and close our service by singing together Psalm 129, from youth they have afflicted me, 129.

The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.

May 26, 2024
The Promise of the Christ Child

About this sermon

1. Without the light of the Messiah, mankind walks in the gloomy darkness of sin (vv. 1-2).
2. The promised Messiah brings joy, freedom, and Peace (vv. 3-5).
3. Behold, the promise of the Christ Child (vv. 6-7).

More sermons from Isaiah · Browse all sermons

Sermon transcript

for the reading of the word. My sermon text this evening is taken from the book of the prophet Isaiah 9 verses 1 through 7. I’m going to begin reading in chapter 8 verse 19 to fill out the context a bit, but let us turn our attention to this portion of God’s Word beginning in Isaiah chapter 8 verse 19 and reading through chapter 9 verse 7. Hear my friends the Word of God. And when they say to you, inquire of the mediums and the necromancers who chirp and mutter, should not a people inquire of their God? Should they inquire of the dead on behalf of the living? To the teaching and to the testimony, if they will not speak according to this word, it is because they have no dawn. They will pass through the land greatly distressed and hungry.

And when they are hungry, they will be enraged and will speak contemptuously against their king and their God and turn their faces upward. And they will look to the earth, but behold, distress and darkness, the gloom of anguish, and they will be thrust into thick darkness. But there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish. In the former time, he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali. But in the latter time, he has made glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone. You have multiplied the nation. You have increased its joy. They rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as they are glad when they divide the spoil.

For the yoke of his burden and the staff for his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian. For every boot of the tramping warrior in battle tumult and every garment rolled in blood will be burned as fuel for the fire. For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end. On the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this. Dear friends, the grass withers and the flower fades, but the Word of our God endures forever.

Shall we seek the Lord’s blessing upon the preaching of His Word? Almighty God, our Heavenly Father, we thank you that you have spoken to us and you have given to us a reliable Word from heaven. For, Lord, you have given us the Holy Scriptures, your God-breathed, inerrant, infallible, authoritative Word. We ask, Heavenly Father, that Through the illuminating work of your Holy Spirit, your word would indeed be understood and received by us this morning. We pray that you would open our minds and our hearts to behold wondrous things from your word. And we would ask, O Lord, that you would use me, wretched sinner though I am, to proclaim your word. Set a guard over my lips that I might speak only that which is faithful in your sight. For the glory of your name, for the edification of your people, and for the honor of Jesus Christ. our risen Lord and Savior, for it is in his name that we pray and all of God’s people said, amen.

You may be seated. I’d like to draw the attention of the children who are with us today to your sermon outlines where there are a number of words that I would encourage you to be listening for in my sermon today. The title of my sermon today is The Promise of the Christ Child. There’s an old commercial for Heinz ketchup that I remember from my childhood days, and some of you may remember this as well. This commercial used a song with the following words. Anticipation. Anticipation is making me wait. It’s keeping me waiting. You remember that song? I’m going to spare you singing it. Well, why such a song? Well, it seems that the reason why the advertisers for Heinz Ketchup used that song to advertise their product was because they were claiming that their product was so jam-packed full of juicy tomatoes, so thick, so yummy, that it was very slow in coming out of the bottle.

It seems they were suggesting that their product was so yummy that it will have you sitting on the edge of your seat, drooling with anticipation as you wait for that thick, juicy Heinz ketchup to finally make its journey out of the bottle and descend with flavorful delight upon your hamburger or upon whatever else you are smearing that ketchup upon. Well, dear ones, why do I bring up this song about anticipation? Well, I know we Presbyterians aren’t really big on the church calendar, but in the traditional church calendar in the Advent season, the church has instituted the Advent season as a season of anticipation. One of the purposes behind the traditional Advent season is to awaken in God’s people a sense of anticipation as we look forward to celebrating the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ, on Christmas Day.

This sense of anticipation that we are meant to feel as we look forward to Christmas Day is intended to be similar to the sense of anticipation that believers in Old Testament times felt as they yearned with longing hearts for the arrival of the Messiah onto the scene of human history. The Holy Spirit had inspired the Old Testament prophets to kindle a sense of yearning and anticipation in the hearts of God’s people through their many predictions about the coming of the Messiah. And some of the clearest and most powerful prophecies about the coming Messiah are found in the Old Testament book of the prophet Isaiah. And the passage from Isaiah chapter nine that we will be considering on this Lord’s Day morning is one of those amazing messianic prophecies and one of the clearest messianic prophecies in all of Holy Scripture.

And so friends, I want you to try to put yourselves into the sandals of Old Testament believers. I want you to imagine, imagine what it must have been like to live in a world where Jesus Christ had not yet been born. Imagine living in a world where you had never heard the name of Jesus and you did not know who the Messiah would be. I want you to imagine what it must have been like for God’s covenant people to live for long centuries, even for millennia, without having known the full and glorious and final light of divine revelation that came into this sin-darkened world on the day when Jesus Christ, the light of the world, was finally born. Oh, God’s covenant people who lived before the coming of Christ certainly had been blessed with a great deal of spiritual light and spiritual truth, especially when compared with the deep shroud of pagan darkness that covered the nations of the Gentiles which had surrounded Israel.

God’s people in the Old Testament, they had the light of God’s law, his Torah, his covenant instruction. They had the light of God’s covenant promises. They had the tabernacle and later on the temple where God’s special presence dwelt and where they could experience God’s grace and forgiveness through the old covenant sacrificial system. Indeed, they had many privileges and they had much spiritual light, especially when compared with the unbelieving nations which surrounded them. But still, the Old Testament system was but a shadow, but a type of the Christ who was to come and of His saving work. compared to the full light of the Lord Jesus Christ and the completed revelation of the new covenant. The Old Testament system was like a flashlight, but God’s revelation through Jesus Christ is like a blinding floodlight. Our text for this Lord’s Day morning points us forward with anticipation to this great light, this light whom we know to be Jesus Christ.

So let’s dive into our text for today. And the first point I want to make as we focus on the first two verses of our passage for today, we learn first of all that without the light of the Messiah, mankind walks in the gloomy darkness, of sin. Without the light, the saving light of Jesus the Messiah, humanity walks in the gloomy darkness of sin. Let me read again verses 1 and 2. Isaiah, under the inspiration of the Spirit, writes, But there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish in the former time he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali. But in the latter time He has made glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light.

Those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone. Friends, if you know the overall story of the Bible, you know that the Bible teaches that God created mankind, male and female, after his own image and likeness. He created humanity very good in knowledge, righteousness, and holiness with dominion over the creatures. But you also know what happened when Adam and Eve were put to the test in the Garden of Eden and were subjected to the temptation of Satan. Did they maintain their original integrity? No. Tragically, they fell into Remember God had appointed Adam to be the representative man. He was a faithful representative of all of humanity. And so when Adam fell, we fell in covenantal solidarity with him. We fell in Adam. And then the tragedy of human history began.

Since man’s fall into sin, the Scriptures paint a very dark and a very gloomy picture of human history before the coming of Jesus the Messiah. You recall the history of Adam and Eve. When they fell, what does God do? He kicks them out of the garden. And when they give birth to Cain and Abel, what happens? Cain murders his brother Abel, and the human race becomes a race of violence. And then God finally sends a flood judgment in the days of Noah that destroys the human race and spares only Noah and his family. But even after the Noahic flood, as humanity once again repopulates the earth, what happens? Well, a little bit later, there’s the Tower of Babel, where fallen humanity seeks to consolidate its autonomous power in rebellion against the creator of heaven and earth, and God has to come down and disperse them and confuse their tongues.

In the days of the patriarchs, in the days when God called Abram to leave the land of Ur of the Chaldeans and to go to the promised land, Abraham himself had been a pagan, an idol worshiper before God, Yahweh the Lord in mercy called him. In the days of the patriarch Abraham, it is as if the knowledge of God, the saving knowledge of God had been all but destroyed in the human race. Then God though raises up Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and eventually the Israelites come about as a people, but they are enslaved in the land of Egypt. And when God rescues them from their slavery in Egypt and brings them through the Red Sea on dry ground and brings them to Mount Sinai and gives him his law, speaks his 10 commandments to them, what happens?

The people rebel in the wilderness. And that whole generation, minus a few who are saved by the remnants, who are saved by grace, is preserved. And when God finally raises up Israel to be a covenant nation, is the history of Israel that you read about in the Old Testament, is it a history of onwards and upwards? Is it the victorious, godly life? No, it is a history of God’s people, time and time and time and time again, turning their backs on the God who had been so merciful to them. And God raises up prophets to call them back to repentance and covenant fidelity. And there were some periods of renewal and revival in Old Testament history under Hezekiah and Josiah and so forth. But the overall history of the Covenant people is a very dim and dark history.

Now, you will recall that under King David and his son Solomon, the light seemed at that point in redemptive history to shine the brightest, at least from an Old Testament perspective. The Covenant nation was finally stable, at least outwardly speaking. It was prosperous and powerful. The temple of Yahweh the Lord that Solomon had built in Jerusalem was a majestic and powerful testimony to the glory, the kingship, and the mercy of the Lord and of his abiding covenant presence amongst his people. But very soon, the darkness descended again. Indeed, it started to descend upon Israel even in the days of King Solomon. Though Solomon was a great and wise leader of God’s people, Solomon also had a problem with women. He had many wives, and his foreign wives drew his heart away from the Lord. And that began a downward cycle.

Soon the darkness descended again. During the reign of Solomon’s son Rehoboam, the covenant nation was divided into the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah. Darkness, national darkness, had started to descend once again. Israel, the northern kingdom, composed of the tribes which had rejected the rule of the Davidic king of Jerusalem, was especially wicked. God brought His fierce judgment upon the northern kingdom through the invasion of the Assyrian king Tiglath-Pileser III in 734 and 732 BC. Through the invasion and exile of the northern kingdom, the people of Israel experienced darkness on a national level, a national darkness which was God’s judgment for the spiritual darkness that resided within their hearts. The two regions of the northern kingdom which were the first to suffer from the Assyrian invasion of 732 BC were the regions of Zebulun and Naphtali.

These are the regions which Isaiah is referring to in our passage for today. But interestingly These were the first two regions to be hit by God’s righteous judgment, but notice that these were also the regions where our Lord Jesus Christ focused much of His earthly ministry. In fact, we’re told in the Gospel of Matthew, verses 13 through 16, we are told that this prophecy here in Isaiah was fulfilled through our Lord Jesus’ ministry in the region of Galilee. Let’s turn to Matthew 4, and let me just briefly read Matthew 4, verses 13 through 16. We read the following. It says, and leaving Nazareth, He went and lived in Capernaum by the sea in the territory of where? In the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali, so that what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled.

The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali by the way of the sea beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles, the people dwelling in darkness have seen a great light. And for those dwelling in the region and shadow of death, on them a light has dawned. From that time, Jesus began to preach, saying, repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Dear ones, Zebulun and Naphtali experienced deep political darkness under the Assyrian invasion in 732 BC. But much worse than political darkness is the spiritual darkness of sin. Jesus Christ came as the light of the world to dispel the darkness of sin. The first advent of Christ means that light has come to drive away the darkness of sin and death. Because without the light of the Messiah, Jesus, mankind walks in the darkness of sin.

Again, as it says in verse two, the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. And what is that great light? Or I should say, who is that great light? I’m sure the children know the answer to that. The great light is Jesus. He is the light of the world. My dear listener, has the light of Christ shone upon your sin-darkened soul? And so we see here the setting of this prophecy and what Isaiah, through the Spirit’s inspiration, is speaking to. But next, let us consider the promised Messiah and what he brings to us. And this brings me to my second point. Notice in verses three through five that the promised Messiah brings joy, freedom, and peace. The promised Messiah. Let’s first of all focus on the promise of joy in verse 3.

It says in verse 3, you have multiplied the nation, you have increased its what? Its joy. They rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as they are glad when they divide the spoil. Isaiah here uses two metaphors, two illustrations to describe the joy that the Messiah brings. He first of all uses the picture or illustration of harvest and then he also uses the picture of dividing the spoil. Regarding the first picture or illustration of this joy that the Messiah brings, we are given an agricultural image. When a farmer who has toiled long and hard in his fields is blessed with a bountiful harvest, there is great rejoicing in the farmer’s household and among his workers. And with respect to dividing the spoils, when an army conquers an enemy after an intense battle, there was great rejoicing among the soldiers who are on the winning side as they divide the spoil from the enemy camp.

And this is what the joy of the Messiah is compared to, like the joy of harvest, like the joy of victorious soldiers dividing the spoil amongst themselves. This is like the kind of joy that the Lord Jesus Christ brings to sinful people whom he redeems. Great rejoicing, indeed joy inexpressible and full of glory. Why is it that we who are believers in Christ, followers of Christ, why is it that we can be joyful? Though we deserve God’s wrath and judgment, He has loved us. He sent His Son to die for us. He has redeemed us. He has forgiven us. And we are now in His grace, under the umbrella of His grace. We have a standing in grace and there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. Our earthly sojourn here in this fallen world presents us with many opportunities, not opportunities, but many occasions where we experience anything but joy, where we experience pain, sorrow, grief, suffering.

But even in the midst of all of these challenges of living in a fallen, sin-cursed world, we, brothers and sisters, we have the joy of the Lord. Indeed, the joy of the Lord is our strength. And what gives us joy? Knowing that Jesus was born for us, lived for us, died for us, rose for us, reigns for us, intercedes for us, and is coming back for us. We belong to him both now and forevermore. Rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I say, rejoice. The Messiah’s reign would indeed bring joy, but also Isaiah predicts that it would bring freedom. Look at verse four. It says, from the yoke of his burden and the staff for his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian. Now these images of the yoke and the staff, these are figures of oppression.

And the day of Midian refers to the Judge Gideon’s defeat of the Midianites as recorded back in Judges 7, verses 22 to 25. That was a very memorable historical event in the history of Israel that the people of God would look back upon as God granted them victory and deliverance from the Midianites through Gideon. Again, all of this is ultimately fulfilled in Jesus Christ, for Christ does more than save his people from political oppression. Indeed, he saves his people from their sins. As we’re told in Matthew 1, verse 21, the reason that he is to be named Jesus, or Yeshua, which means the Lord is salvation, is because, as it says in Matthew 1, 21, he will save his people from O people of God, consider all of the freedoms that Jesus Christ has won for you.

You have been blessed, brother or sister in Christ, with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. In Christ, you are forgiven. In Christ, you are justified. In Christ, you are adopted. In Christ, you are sanctified and are being sanctified. In Christ, you will be glorified. In Christ, you are being kept unto the day of resurrection. This is true freedom indeed. But the reign of the promised Messiah would also bring peace, as we’re told in verse five. For every boot of the tramping warrior in battle tumult and every garment rolled in blood will be burned as fuel for the fire. The picture that Isaiah gives us in this verse is a picture of the aftermath of battle, when the noise of battle is finally over and peace has finally come. from the battle is collected and is burned up in the fire.

This is a wonderful picture of the coming of the Messiah. For Jesus the Messiah is indeed, as we see in this passage, the Prince of Peace. Through the coming of the Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of the living God, has come the establishment of peace between a holy God and his sinful people. The Apostle Paul speaks of this peace, for example, in Romans 5, verses 1 and 2. In that wonderful passage in the Epistle to the Romans, Paul writes as he speaks of our justification before God, he says, Therefore, in other words, in view of all that he’s written up to this point, therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him, we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

How about you, dear listener? You have peace with God. You say, well, how can I have peace with God? Through Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ, the God-man, the Word made flesh, he came to this earth to pay the penalty for sin. and to bless with his perfect everlasting righteousness all who put their faith and trust in him. Jesus Christ was crucified for the forgiveness of our sins and raised from the dead for our justification and that we might receive the gift of eternal life. The word of God says that if you believe, that is if you trust in the Lord Jesus Christ and Christ alone for salvation from your sin, you will be saved. No question about it. There isn’t any fine print. God’s word is truth. You can bank your eternal salvation on it. Repent, believe in Christ, and you will be saved.

So friends, we have joy, freedom, and peace. And again, who makes all of this possible? Well, that brings me to my final point, as we consider verses six and seven. Behold the promise of the Christ child. Behold the promise of the Christ child. It says in verse six and seven, for to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder. And his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and of peace, there will be no end. of David, the Messiah, the promised Messiah was to be of the house and lineage of David. So this is clearly a messianic prophecy on the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore.

The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this. If Yahweh the Lord is zealous to accomplish something, it will be accomplished. Friends, the words of the final two verses of our passage are familiar to many, especially because of that musical masterpiece, Handel’s Messiah. All of the blessings that Isaiah prophesies of in verses one through five are made possible only because, as verse six tells us, to us a child is born, to us a son is given. The seed of the woman who would come and crush the head of the serpent as predicted all the way back in Genesis chapter three, verse 15. In that proto-evangelium, that first pronouncement of the gospel, the seed of the woman who would crush the head of the serpent has finally come. The promised child predicted by Isaiah here, he is here and his name is Jesus.

Now there is a great deal, friends, that we could learn from these final two verses of our passage for today, but there’s not sufficient time for me to give a detailed explanation, otherwise we’d be here a very long time. But there are a few things that we would do well to take to heart from these verses. First of all, notice that Isaiah tells us that this child will be divine. This child, though a genuine child, a genuine son, will also be divine, will be God. And this is clear from the messianic names ascribed to this child in verse 6. His name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Now, think about the term name. In our culture, names often tend to be labels. And oftentimes parents have different reasons for choosing particular names for their particular children.

And those names can often have great meaning or significance attached to them. But sometimes children are just named something because it sounds nice. It sounds like a nice name for our son or our daughter. But in biblical times, your name represented your character, represented who you actually were. And when Isaiah, when the Holy Spirit, I should say, through Isaiah, predicts that this child, this messianic son, this messianic child, that his name would be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, this is not mere hyperbole. This is not just metaphor. He is saying that this child will be these things. He will be the wonderful counselor, the mighty God, the everlasting Father. And of course, Jesus, you might scratch your head and say, wait a minute, Jesus is the Son of God, the eternal Son of the Father.

So why is He called the everlasting Father? Well, remember that our Lord Jesus Christ is perfectly at one with the Father. He says, I and the Father are one. though they are distinct persons of the Godhead, yet they are one in divinity, sharing one divine essence together, and their purposes are one, and so forth. And he is the everlasting father, the prince of peace. These are divine names. These verses also strongly emphasize that this promised child would reign. Jesus was and is a king. In fact, the scriptures tell us Christ is what? King of kings and Lord of lords. And his kingship, his kingdom, is over all. Jesus has a kingdom, a government, and he rules over all. Here’s the thing about Jesus. His kingdom is not just a particular nation or political entity. with respect to His divine providence.

Our Lord Jesus Christ is King of all things. He is providentially King and Lord over the furthest galaxies. He is King over the universe as well as King over every little detail in the microverse. Every little cell and chromosome, every little atom and electron and so forth is under His sovereign sway and rule. But when it comes to His kingdom of grace and salvation, His kingdom is international. It’s universal in scope. It’s not tied in to a particular political entity. And that’s important for us to understand, especially this year ahead. It’s probably gonna be a pretty crazy year as it’s gonna be a presidential election year. And there’s gonna be the temptation among God’s people to identify God’s kingdom and identify Christianity in the gospel with what goes on in this particular nation. And that’s wrong, beloved.

Jesus Christ is King of Kings. His kingdom is an international kingdom. Jesus Christ went to the cross and purchased people from every tribe and tongue and people and nation and every political entity. The redeemed sons and daughters of God are taken from all of the nations, all of the political entities included of humanity. This was not the way it was in the Old Testament. In Old Testament times, the church under the Old Covenant was a national theocracy in the land of Israel. But now with the coming of Christ, this promised Son, Christ as we saw in that passage from Galatians that I read earlier in the service. Now in Christ there is no Jew nor Greek, male or female, we are all one in Christ Jesus. Now with the coming of Christ and the new covenant, the Church of God is not limited to a national theocratic entity, the Church is international.

You don’t even have to be a citizen of the United States to join Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church. If you reside here and you wanna join here, and you happen to have citizenship in another nation, that’s not a barrier to you becoming a member of this church, because the church is international. That’s why we don’t have a flag up front. Okay, I know that might be a controversial thing to say, but at least that’s why I’m glad we don’t have a flag up front. Not that I’m against the flag, I love our flag and what it represents. is not a servant of the United States. The United States is not the city on the hill. The Church of Jesus Christ is. Christ is King of kings and Lord of lords. To us, a child is born, a son is given, and the government, not the American government, but the government of all of his people in all ages, this government over all the universe, there will be no end. because he reigns upon the throne of David.

Does he reign on the throne of your heart, dear listener? Does he reign on the throne of my heart? The Old Testament promised that the Messiah would be from the house and lineage of King David, and as King, the Messiah fulfilled that promise. Dear listener, again, do you willingly and gladly submit to the reign of King Jesus. Is Jesus Christ, who was born as a baby in Bethlehem, but who is now exalted as King of Kings at the Father’s right hand, is he your Lord? Friends, as Christmas Day quickly approaches, and by the way, Merry Christmas to all of you, let us anticipate Christ’s birth and look forward to his return, for he is coming again for us at the end of this age. Amen. Let us pray. Our Lord and Father in heaven, sovereign and eternal God, we do thank you for these glad tidings of great joy.

We thank you for the privilege of living in this age of redemptive history when our Savior has already come the first time and has redeemed us by his blood. And we thank you that he reigns over all. We pray that his reign would be more and more evident in each and every one of us and in this church, Lord, known as Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church. And Lord Jesus, we worship you, we praise you as King of kings and Lord of lords. We celebrate your birth, we celebrate your person and work. We pray all these things in your holy and awesome name and all of God’s people said, amen. Let’s respond to what we’ve heard by rising and we’ll sing together. Park the Herald Angels sing 311311.

The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.

December 24, 2023
In the Last Days

About this sermon

Isaiah foresees the last days, when the mountain of the Lord’s house rises above every hill and the nations stream to it to learn God’s ways. The last days began with Christ’s first advent, and Christ himself is the true temple on that mountain, with his people as living stones. The peace of swords beaten into plowshares is already present in Christ and will come in full at his return. God teaches his ways so that his people will walk in them, and sound doctrine must lead to faithful living.

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Sermon transcript

Now, I’d like to invite you to rise for the reading of the sermon text this morning, which is found in Isaiah chapter two. We’re going to take a little break from our study of the gospel of Mark for this Advent season. I’m going to be doing an Advent mini series, and we start the Advent series with a passage from the book of the prophet Isaiah, Isaiah chapter two, verses one through five. So, friends, let us hear. God’s holy word. The word which Isaiah, the son of Amos, saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. Now it will come about that in the last days, the mountain of the house of the Lord will be established as the chief of the mountains and will be raised above the hills and all the nations will stream to it. And many peoples will come and say, Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us concerning his ways and that we may walk in his paths.

For the law will go forth from Zion and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And he will judge between the nations and will render decisions for many peoples. And they will hammer their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation. and never again will they learn war. Come, House of Jacob, and let us walk in the light of the Lord. Dear friends, the grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever. Let’s ask the Lord’s blessing upon the preaching of his word. Our Lord and Father in heaven, what a privilege it is to hear from the creator of the universe, to have the gift of revelation from you. We thank you, God, that you have given us your word. It is indeed a lamp unto our feet, a light unto our path, a guide unto our way.

We ask that by your spirit you would now instruct us from the word. We pray that you would give us open minds and open hearts to behold wondrous things from your word. And we do ask that you would grant unto me, your unworthy servant, the grace to declare your word with clarity and power and with the assistance of your Holy Spirit. for the glory of your name, the edification of your saints and the salvation of the lost. In Jesus name we pray and all of God’s people said Amen. You may be seated. Title of my sermon this Lord’s Day morning is in the last And there’s a number of key words you can be listening for today, as you’ll notice in your sermon outline. Advent, redemptive history, last days, mountain, temple, Messiah, peace, and promises.

And children, if you’re looking for some particular words to keep track of in my sermon, I’d recommend the words mountain, peace, and promises. Well, dear friends, this time of year is the season in the traditional church calendar that is known as the season of Advent. Now, what does the word advent mean? Children, what do you think the word advent means? Well, advent is a word that means coming. It refers to our Lord’s arrival. When we talk about the first advent of Jesus, we’re talking about when our Lord Jesus came to this earth in his incarnation to be born of the Virgin Mary in Bethlehem. And when we talk about the second advent of Jesus, we’re talking about a future time when the Lord Jesus Christ, who went back into heaven after his resurrection, will come again to this earth from heaven, not as a baby, but rather in great power and glory in the clouds of heaven.

The second coming of our Lord will be not an obscure or secretive coming, as was his first advent. But it will be a rival, a coming that all of the universe will know of. So right now, brothers and sisters, we find ourselves living in a period of redemptive history between our Lord’s first advent, which took place 2000 years ago, and his future glorious second advent, which is yet to come. In our passage for this Lord’s Day morning, the prophet Isaiah writes about this present period of redemptive history in which we find ourselves living. This age between the ages, this period of time between our Lord’s first advent and his future second advent. And as I will hope to demonstrate, this prophecy of Isaiah that we’re considering this morning is a prediction about the messianic age, this present Messianic age, this present age of redemptive history that was ushered in by the first advent of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, a prediction that reveals God’s gracious plan to gather the nations into his kingdom through the missionary labors of Christ’s church and which gives us as God’s people hope and confidence in the present as we look forward to our Lord’s future return.

The Reverend James G. Kirk, in his book, Meditations for Advent and Christmas, introduces our passage as follows, and I quote, he says, Isaiah’s vision is of the time when the mountain of the Lord shall be established. The nations shall flow to it as people seek to learn God’s ways. The law of the Lord will judge all nations fairly. It will be a time when weapons are reforged into instruments for cultivating the land. Indeed, a glorious description, right, of a time of peace. But that description that we find here in this prophecy of Isaiah, does it not sound quite different from the world in which we now live? A world where news of violence, war, terrorism, injustice, oppression and other social upheavals continue to dominate the news cycle, especially nowadays. And yes, we prayed for for the situation in Ukraine.

We know that this brutal war between Russia and Ukraine has already claimed thousands of lives. So where are the swords being reforged into plowshares in our present situation? How then are we to understand and interpret this passage of God’s Word? And how could this passage possibly be referring to this present New Covenant age, given the fact that there are still so many wars and rumors of wars. These are some of the matters that we will be wrestling with as we consider our passage for today. But it’s always important for us, whatever portion of scripture we are considering, to put that passage in its proper context. And so we need to consider the context of our passage for today. Think about the prophet Isaiah. Who was Isaiah? Well, Isaiah was a great prophet of God who received his call to be a prophet probably sometime around 740 BC.

And he was probably martyred by the wicked and brutal Manasseh, king of Judah, sometime around 680 BC. So Isaiah’s prophetic ministry spanned many decades and he prophesied under the reigns of many kings, numerous kings. Isaiah ministered in Judah during a period of time when God’s people were often unfaithful and compromising and giving into the idolatrous ways of their Gentile neighbors and thus in need of being challenged and called to repentance. Isaiah’s prophetic oracles often alternate between threats of judgment on the one hand and gracious promises of mercy on the other hand. We see in our passage for today a gracious promise of mercy, a promise of mercy that will apply to what a period of time that Isaiah describes as the last days. And that brings me to my first main point. If you’re following along in your sermon outline, the first thing I want us to consider is the meaning and significance of the last days.

And sometimes when Christians from various church backgrounds get together and have conversations, one of the favorite topics of conversation among God’s people seems to be prophecy, Bible prophecy. And oftentimes the question is raised, I wonder, are we in the last days? You ever been talking to a brother or sister in Christ and that topic comes up, you know, boy, we must be in the last days. Look at the news. Look at all that’s going on in the world. Well, what does Isaiah mean when he speaks of the last days? Well, let’s dive in. In verses 1 and 2, it says this, the word which Isaiah, the son of Amos, saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. That gives us the setting. This is a word, a revelation from God that Isaiah has received as a prophet of God.

He receives direct revelation from God and he says, Now it will come about that in the last days, some translations say in the latter days, the mountain of the house of the Lord will be established as the chief of the mountains and will be raised above the hills and all the nations will stream to it. The last days, this terminology of the last days, this is what the theologians call an eschatological term or eschatological terminology. This prophecy has eschatological significance, meaning that it points us forward to the outworking of God’s plan in redemptive history. Verse one tells us that Isaiah saw the word, the word which Isaiah, the son of Amos, saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. That language of word and of saw This is the language of divine revelation. Perhaps God revealed this word, this prophecy to Isaiah by means of a vision.

God often communicated his direct revelation to his prophets by means of things such as visions and so forth. And what is the content of this particular vision? Well, it’s interesting, before we dive into the details of this passage, I want you to turn to another prophet of the Old Testament, a prophet who was a contemporary, a younger contemporary of the prophet Isaiah, namely Micah. Turn to Micah chapter 4, and let me read verses 1 through 5 of Micah chapter 4. Micah is after the book of Obadiah, or after the book of Jonah. Micah chapter 4. Verses one through five and see if these words don’t sound familiar to you. And it will come about in the last days that the mountain of the house of the Lord will be established as the chief of the mountains.

It will be raised above the hills and the peoples will stream to it. Many nations will come and say, come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord and to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us about his ways and that we may walk in his paths for from Zion. will go forth the law, even the word of the Lord from Jerusalem, and he will judge between many peoples and render decisions for mighty distant nations. Then they will hammer their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, and never again will they train for war. Each of them will sit under his vine and under his fig tree with no one to make them afraid for the mouth of the Lord of hosts has spoken.

Though all the people walk each in the name of his God, as for us, We will walk in the name of the Lord our God forever and ever.” Does that sound familiar? Well, it should, because it’s almost verbatim the same as the prophecy recorded here in Isaiah chapter 2, prompting some scholars to speculate that perhaps Isaiah borrowed this from Micah, or vice versa, or what have you. Or perhaps both Micah and Isaiah were borrowing from a a prophetic tradition that was already out there and was shared by the prophets of the Lord. But whether this saying was original with Isaiah or not, the Holy Spirit inspired Isaiah to use these words to his own purposes, to take these words upon himself and to communicate them as a word from the Lord to the people. No damage to divine inspiration is provided if Isaiah happens to have borrowed this from Micah or from elsewhere.

But this word did come to the Lord, we are told, and Isaiah communicates it to us. He says, it will come about that in the last days, or latter days. What does this terminology of last days or latter days refer to? Well, as you may have guessed, there are many different interpretations out there in the Christian world. For example, our dispensational friends view this prophecy and this terminology as describing conditions that will take place during a future millennial kingdom, an earthly millennial kingdom when Christ is expected to return to earth and to rule from Jerusalem over a renewed Israelite theocracy until the time of the final judgment and the consummation and so forth. Still others seem to view this passage in Isaiah chapter 2 as as a prophecy describing the eternal state. The last days, according to this view, are the ultimate last days of the new heavens and the new earth wherein righteousness dwells.

But others, and I would include myself in this category, others view this as a description of this present new covenant messianic age, this period of history between our Lord’s first and second advents. When Isaiah speaks of the last days, Well, brothers and sisters, I will show you in a few minutes that the New Testament says that we are in the last days. Indeed, we have been in the last days ever since Jesus came to this earth, died for our sins, rose from the dead, ascended into heaven, and has poured out the Spirit upon the church. One of the great scholars of our church who has supported and advocates this view is Dr. E.J. Young. Dr. Young had written a a massive three-volume commentary on the prophet Isaiah, on the book of Isaiah, and Dr. Young says the following about this particular period, this particular prophecy.

He says, quote, the period which is intended by the phrase, quote, the last days, is the age of the Christian church, which began its course with the first advent of Christ. It is true that from the Old Testament alone so much is not apparent. But in the Old Testament, the phrase does signify the age or time of the Messiah, the period of deliverance and salvation. He goes on to say, Isaiah takes the figures which were the property of the Old Testament economy and makes them the vehicles of expression for the truths of salvation and blessing, which were the characteristics of the age of grace. And, you know, as we compare scripture with scripture, We find this kind of language about the last days, or the latter days, or the last hour. We find this kind of language prominent in the New Testament as well.

One of the places we find that language is in the passage that I read for you earlier in the service from the book of Hebrews. If you go back to Hebrews chapter 1, let me once again read Hebrews 1, verses 1 and 2. Hebrews 1, 1 and 2, we read these words, God, after he spoke long ago, to the fathers, that would be the patriarchs, Moses, the prophets and so forth. After he spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways in these last days has spoken to us in his son whom he appointed heir of all things and so forth. Now notice there’s a contrast in verse one. He speaks about an age that he describes as long ago. the age when God spoke by God appointed prophets.

But then he contrasts the age of long ago to, in verse two, to these last days. In these last days, God has spoken to us in or by his son. Now, let me ask you, folks, when do you think the epistle to the Hebrews was written? What century was this epistle written in? It was written in the first century. Here the author of Hebrews, writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, here he describes the situation that existed even in the first century, the century in which he was writing, as these last days. So if any brother or sister asks you, do you think we’re in the last days? Point them to Hebrews 1 verse 2 and say, yes, we’ve been in the last days since Jesus came to this earth in his first advent.

Or consider 1 John 2, verse 18. 1 John 2, verse 18. John doesn’t just speak of the last days or latter days. He actually speaks of the last hour. In 1 John 2, verse 18, John writes, children, it is the last hour. And just as you heard that antichrist is coming, even now, many antichrists have appeared from this. We know that it is the last hour again. When did the apostle John pen this first epistle? Which century did he write in? Obviously he wrote in the first century and he describes the time in which he was living, not just as the last or latter days, but as the last hour. Brothers and sisters in Christ, what that means is that this is the last period of time before the final consummation of Christ’s kingdom. And that leads me to consider also the significance of the last days.

We’re told in verse two, now it will come about that in the last days, the mountain of the house of the Lord will be established as the chief of the mountains. Now, what does Isaiah mean when he refers to the mountain? of the house of the Lord. Well, in the ancient world, as I’ve pointed out on numerous occasions in my preaching in your midst, in the ancient world, the gods were often worshipped on mountains. Mountains were an appropriate symbol of transcendence and majesty and so forth. And obviously, and I’ve also made the case in the past that I believe that the Garden of Eden was actually a mountainous region. It was the original temple garden of the Lord. from which flowed the streams, the rivers that watered the area around the Garden of Eden. But the mountain of the house of the Lord that Isaiah is referring to here is the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.

And what was the significance of that mountain? That was where the Temple was. And what was the significance of the Temple? The Temple was a symbol of God’s gracious dwelling in the midst of his people. In the temple was the Ark of the Covenant, symbolizing God’s throne, his reign over and presence in the midst of his people. But of course, when we study the scriptures and what the scriptures teach us about the significance of the temple, the Bible points us to the fact that Jesus Christ himself is the living temple and we are living stones in union with Christ. We are living stones that make up that living temple. Christ, the living temple, ultimately fulfills this temple imagery here in the prophet Isaiah. So Isaiah is here using old covenant language to describe the new covenant realities that will come about in the last days, the new covenant realities that are fulfilled in Jesus Christ and in his church.

So in speaking of the mountain of the house of the Lord, brothers and sisters, I would argue that Isaiah is prophesying by that language, that old covenant language. He’s talking about Jesus and the gospel of the kingdom that Jesus brings with his incarnation. He says the mountain of the house of the Lord will be established as the chief of the mountains and will be raised above the hills. And this is significance, the significance, the last line of verse two, and all the nations will stream to it. All the nations will stream to it. What does this speak to? This speaks of the ingathering of the Gentiles. This speaks of the Great Commission. This speaks of the gospel going out into the world and sinners from every tribe and tongue and people and nation being brought to saving faith in the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Gentile nations are pictured as flowing into the Temple Mount to learn the ways of Yahweh, who is described in verse three as the God of Jacob. It says in verse three, And many peoples will come and say, Come, Let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us concerning his ways and that we may walk in his paths. Again, this is Old Testament language being used to picture new covenant realities for the ingathering of the Gentiles into Christ’s church and kingdom that was only made possible by the first advent of our Lord. and by the missionary and evangelistic labors of Christ’s true visible church. And so here we are, 2000 years out from the coming of Christ, and the gospel has spread throughout the world.

And there are believers in almost every corner of the planet today. Yes, there are. There are people groups and there are parts of the world that are closed off to the gospel. We need to pray that God and sovereign mercy would open up those closed people groups in those closed areas. We must pray that God would open up a door for the gospel of Jesus Christ to spread amongst the unreached peoples of the world, for there are still unreached people to be reached for the gospel. But nevertheless, throughout the world today, there are millions upon millions of folk who confess Jesus Christ as Son of God, Savior, Messiah and Lord, and who profess worship and allegiance to him, and that is in fulfillment of this particular prophecy. Beloved, here we see a picture of Gentiles whose hearts have been regenerated and converted.

The evidence of that new birth, the evidence of that conversion being a teachable spirit, a spirit that is willing to learn and follow the ways of the Lord. So for what do these nations, these peoples who stream into of the mountain of the Lord. What is it that they say? Why do they want to go to the mountain of the house of the Lord? Verse three again, come, let us go to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, so that he can make us healthy and wealthy and give us prosperity. Know that he may teach us concerning his ways. You desire to be taught the ways of the Lord. and that we may walk in his path. They want to learn his ways so that they might walk in his path.

That means walking in faith and obedience unto him. For the law will go forth from Zion. Zion is where the Temple Mount was, where the temple was located. But again, that is all that Zion imagery. The mountain of the house of the Lord imagery is all fulfilled in Christ, the living temple. Our Savior and great high priest and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. Your listener. Does this language describe your spiritual state? Your current spiritual state is your heart truly teachable, truly eager to know the ways of the Lord. Do you hunger to know God’s word and to walk in his ways out of gratitude for his gift of salvation? If not, may God the Holy Spirit convict you of sin, humble your heart and bring you to faith in Christ and know that God through the gospel calls you to repent of your sin and to believe upon Christ and Christ alone.

For Christ was crucified for sinners just like you and raised from the dead so that whoever believes in him might not perish but have everlasting life. And so, beloved, we’ve considered the significance and the meaning of the terminology of the last or latter days. But next, I want you to notice, as we move on to verse four, consider the peace of the messianic age. And this is where so many have trouble viewing this as a description of this present age of redemptive history. Verse four, it says, And he will judge between the nations and will render decisions for many peoples, and they will hammer their swords into plowshares. and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation and never again will they learn war. Oh, that we could live in a world without war.

Would that not be a blessed thing? But how are we to understand this passage? Well, friends here, the last day’s age, the last or latter day’s age ushered in by the Messiah is idealized as a time of universal peace among the nations. It is pictured as a time when weapons of war and violence, namely things such as swords and spears, are to be refashioned into peaceful domestic instruments, things like plowshares and pruning hooks. Again, it is precisely here that many Christians have trouble believing that this passage is a description of this present age, since there are still so many wars and rumors of wars in our world today. Some believe that this verse refers to and predicts a future golden age for the church, a time before the return of Christ, when the nations of the world will be converted as a whole and Christianized, not through political action or military action or cultural endeavors or what have you, but through the missionary labors of the church, through the power of the gospel and a great outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon the nations.

And this is one possible way to understand this passage. This is the view known as the post-millennial view. It was a view held by many of our Puritan forefathers. It was also a view that was held by some of the prominent Princeton theologians like B.B. Warfield and Charles Hodge and A.A. Hodge and so forth. It’s a view that is attractive and yet, I don’t know about you brothers and sisters, I’m not fully convinced of it because I think that it does not take into consideration other biblical data. And so I tend to think that Dr. Young, since I’ve been quoting from E.J. Young, I think he offers a wiser, more biblically sound and consistent perspective when he writes the following. He says, even at the present day, insofar as men believe the gospel and seek to practice it in their lives, this prophecy finds fulfillment.

At the same time, it must be remembered that sin is still present. And it will not be until the complete removal of sin at the second advent of the Lord that this prophecy will be realized in its completeness. In other words, he’s arguing for what the theologians call an already, not yet, aspect to this prophecy. Yes, in principle and in Christ, we are already at peace. But in reality, in terms of the outworking of that, there is still a lot of war. Only when Christ returns will the reality and the situation in principle become a visible reality. Again, friends, it would seem that in verse 4, Isaiah is using this idealized language of international peace to point to a deeper spiritual reality. And that spiritual reality is the union of Jew and Gentile who believe in the Messiah in the one covenant people of God.

This is not, as our dispensational brothers and sisters sometimes accuse us of, this is not, quote, replacement theology. This is what might be better described as expansion theology. The true church of Jesus Christ, the true Israel of God, the church does not replace Israel. The church is the Israel of God, expanded to include the Gentiles. In the old covenant, under the old covenant, the church was confined to a national theocracy. But now the Church of Jesus Christ is an international reality, inclusive of Jew and Gentile, who profess faith in Jesus as the Messiah, the Christ, the Son of the Living God, the Savior of sinners. And so, by his incarnation and saving work, Jesus Christ has already, in principle, secured this spiritual peace of which Isaiah prophesies. We see that brought out by the Apostle Paul in his wonderful epistle to the Ephesians.

If you look with me at Ephesians chapter two, and let me just read a few verses from, let me start at verse 11 and read through verse 19 of Ephesians chapter two. And in this passage, Paul is addressing Gentile Christians in particular. And he says this, he says, therefore, remember that formerly you, The Gentiles in the flesh who are called, quote, uncircumcision by the so-called circumcision, which is performed in the flesh by human hands. Remember that you were at that time, at that time before the coming of Christ, before before you came to faith in Christ, you were at that time excluded from the Commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus. You who formerly were far off, that would be the Gentiles, have been brought near.

And how have the Gentiles been brought near and incorporated into the covenant people of God by the blood of Christ, by his substitutionary atonement? And notice verse 14. For he himself is our peace. This is the peace that Isaiah 2 verse 4, I believe, is speaking of. Christ himself is our peace who made both groups into one. and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall by abolishing in his flesh the enmity, which is the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so that in himself he might make the two into one new man, thus establishing what? Peace. And might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross, by it having put to death the enmity. And he came and preached peace to you who were far away, That would be, again, the Gentiles and peace to those who were near.

That would be the Jews. For through him, through Christ, we both have our access in one spirit to the father. So then you, you Gentiles, you’re no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and are of God’s household. You are now, even if you’re a Gentile, if you believe in Jesus as the Messiah, you are a child of Abraham. You are in. the Israel of God, the true church of the Lord Jesus Christ. Dear friends, our Lord Jesus, the Prince of Peace, said in Matthew five verse nine in one of his Beatitudes, he says, Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God by the grace of God. Let us strive as brothers and sisters in Christ who, in principle, are already at peace with one another and peace with God, our Heavenly Father.

Let us strive to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace, as we are exhorted to in Ephesians 4, verse 3. But what is the conclusion of all of this that we’ve considered, this great prophecy of the prophet Isaiah? Well, that brings me to my final point. Let us consider, finally, the moral imperative of these last or latter-day promises, the moral imperative implied by these latter-day promises. In verse five, Isaiah, again, writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, he says, Come house of Jacob and let us what? Let us walk in the light of the Lord. The Bible talks about walking with the Lord or in the light of the Lord, and it’s talking about living out the implications of your faith, walking in faith and obedience. Since the Gentile nations will seek Yahweh and his word in the last or latter days, this messianic age, as we were told back in verses three and four, since that is the case, should not the professed covenant people of God among Isaiah’s contemporaries, who are described here as the house of Jacob, should they not walk, meaning live in faith and obedience to God’s ways?

Isaiah’s contemporaries weren’t walking in faith and obedience. walking in idolatry and unbelief. And so he calls them to walk in the light of the Lord. To walk in the light of the Lord is to walk under the guide of his Torah, his covenant instruction by faith. And should not we, who are God’s professed covenant people today in this messianic new covenant age, should we not seek to walk the talk and live out the implications of the truth that we learn from God’s word? That’s, of course, a rhetorical question. The obvious answer is, of course, we should. Yes, we should. Dear ones, the goal of learning the word of God is so that we may walk in his paths, as we are reminded in verse three, come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us concerning his ways and that we may walk in his paths.

And that’s very significant. The goal of learning sound doctrine, and we in the OPC, we love sound doctrine, and well, we should. Sound doctrine is important. Knowing your Bible is important. Knowing sound doctrine and theology is vitally, vitally important. But the goal of learning such subjects is not merely to stuff our heads full of Bible knowledge and theological truth. Remember that knowledge can puff up, but love builds up. The goal of doctrinal instruction is discipleship. And children, what is a disciple? A disciple is a student. If you are a disciple of Jesus, that means you have been enrolled in the school of Christ and you’ve been enrolled in the school of Christ. Your baptism implies that, by the way. You’ve been summoned and enrolled into the school of Christ so that you may learn how to walk with Jesus in faith and repentance.

The goal of doctrinal instruction is discipleship. The end goal of instruction in the ways of the Lord is obedient living unto the Lord. Learning Bible truth without living out what you learn, well, that will turn you into either a self-righteous Pharisee or a hyper-critical, hypocritical, theological nitpicker. And sadly, we in the Reformed tradition have too many of those. One of the things I’ve noticed over the years of my ministry in the OPC, and I love the OPC and I love the reformed faith. But I have periodically encountered individuals who they love theology. They love to talk about the things of the Lord. They’re really into theology, and let’s talk about superlapsarianism and infralapsarianism and all of that. They get into all of the deep theological stuff, and I love that stuff, too. I think that’s wonderful stuff.

But then they don’t always live out the implications of their faith in their daily lives. Beloved, that’s not the way it ought to be. Let us make learning sound doctrine a top priority in our lives and in the church. But let us also make sure that we are learning so that we might live out the implications of what we learn in faith and obedience. Let us echo What the people described here in verse three say, Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob. In other words, let us go on to Jesus, the living temple and his gospel. And that we may that he may teach us concerning his ways and that we may what walk in his paths, may God give us the grace to respond to his word with with such faith-filled obedience.

Amen. Let us pray. Lord and Father in heaven, we do thank you and praise you that you have caused your kingdom to spread throughout the world. We thank you for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. We thank you for the Great Commission. We thank you that you are spreading your word through your church throughout the world and drawing many sinners from every tribe and tongue and people and nation to faith in Christ and repentance unto life. We ask that you would grant us the grace, O Lord, to learn from your ways and to walk in obedience to your word. In Jesus’ name we pray and all of God’s people said, Amen.

The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.

December 4, 2022
Living in Light of the Sovereignty of God

About this sermon

In the year King Uzziah died, Isaiah saw the Lord high and lifted up, with the seraphim crying, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts.” Confronted with God’s holiness, Isaiah cried out that he was a man of unclean lips, and a coal from the altar took away his guilt before the Lord asked, “Whom shall I send?” In times of crisis and transition, God’s people look to his sovereignty, his mercy, and his calling, and they find their blessing in him.

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Sermon transcript

Book of Isaiah, familiar passage, chapter 6. We’re going to be looking at verses 1 to 8. We should be at 1 to 8 this morning. Hear God’s Word. In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne high and lifted up, and the train of his robe filled the temple.

Above him stood the seraphim, each had six wings with With two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called to another and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is filled with his glory. And the foundations of the threshold shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke.

And I said, Woe is me, for I am lost. For I’m a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of people of unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth and said, Behold, this has touched your lips. Your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.

And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, Whom shall I send and who will go for us? Then I said, here am I. Send me. Let’s pray. Heavenly Father, as the author of this word, we pray now that you might give us eyes to see and ears to hear and hearts to truly listen and obey and wills to be inclined towards your will that we might do that which is pleasing in your sight. Speak your word to us. Encourage us on the way with a vision of yourself. In Christ’s name we pray. Amen.

Let me ask you, my friend, have you ever experienced a time of crisis in your life? A time of unrest, uncertainty, fear that literally the bottom would drop out? Ever wondered in such time, where is God? in all of this? Why does he allow this to happen? Or why is he so seemingly silent?

Isaiah and the people of God had such an unsettling experience, a time of great uncertainty and genuine soul-searching as found here in the very first words of Isaiah chapter 6, in the year that King Uzziah died. King Uzziah was a good king. Also known as Azariah, he became the king at age 16, and he reigned in Jerusalem for 52 years. Though not perfect, he sought to do what was right in the eyes of the Lord, and the Lord blessed him and Judah as a result tremendously. Under his leadership, the people of God prospered militarily, politically, and economically.

But now this great leader was gone. Who would follow? Who would possibly be able to do all that he had done? Who could possibly lead God’s people in the way that he had? It was clearly the end of a generation. What did the future hold? What change was inevitable? How would the changing of the guard affect the spiritual health and prosperity of God’s people?

And no doubt these things were of concern to the prophet Isaiah as he sought the face of God through prayer. What was God’s answer to Isaiah’s troubled heart? It was a vision of himself. So as we look at that vision this morning, I encourage you to keep your Bibles open there, Isaiah chapter 6, for the first thing that we see is the sovereignty of God. By the Spirit, Isaiah is ushered in to the throne room of heaven, and there he sees what words cannot even begin to describe.

He sees the King, the King of glory, dressed and adorned. The words you say, that the train of His robe, the splendor of His majesty, it fills the entire temple. He crowds everything else out, seemingly. Alex Boyer comments on this passage, God’s sovereignty is real. He sits on a throne in the seat of authority and power, high and exalted. The Lord is high in His own nature, exalted or lifted up by the acknowledgement of His sovereignty. The phrase, fill the temple, expresses the general truth. that God is present in all his majesty at the center of his people’s lives. The temple is no mere symbol of his indwelling presence. It is the reality of it.

Isaiah Zasherdini sees this. And the Lord Almighty there on the throne is surrounded by the seraphim, literally the burning ones, reflecting the glory of God. in their very image, angels with their faces and their feet covered, lest they look upon God, and crying out, holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty. The whole earth is filled with His glory. As the text tells us, at the sound of their voices, it was like thunder echoing the chambers of heaven.

And the temple is filled with this smoke. Smoke just from the denseness of the glory of God. The only thing I can compare it to by an illustration would be that of, if you’ve ever seen a storm, where it’s just absolutely pouring down rain, and then the sun comes out, and the heat causes all of this thing to rise. to vaporize. You can’t really see through it. It’s just a denseness. And here is the glory of God as that’s being portrayed and reflected by the angels and pronounced in all the earth. It’s just coming back to him in this great cloud. Who is in control over all that happens in heaven on earth? It is none other than the Lord God Almighty, our Savior and our King. Now, my friend, let me ask you this question. In light of this passage, what is your view of God? Our culture has many views of God.

Sometimes we hear him referred to as the man upstairs. You know, kind of this being, a deity, sort of just kind of overlooking everything and just sort of matching it by his presence. Maybe there’s those in our culture who view this, and certainly the deists of old viewed it this way, as God is just a very wise person. Almost like a nice grandfather figure. A benevolent ruler who’s, you know, he’s just been around longer than everybody else and just wants to shower people with blessings and lead them in right directions. There’s some who view God, and perhaps those in the titans of business and industry and politics, as a man in charge. He’s the one who’s calling the shots. He’s the one to whom everyone else reports.

Well, God forbid there are those in our culture who see God merely as a force, an impersonal power that controls our fates. All of these views of God are inadequate. And that, dear ones, is not only unfortunate, it actually is quite dangerous. because we dare not equate God with some image of him that we have created within our own mind and heart. That is idolatry.

The true and the living God has revealed himself, and not just to Isaiah, but to his people throughout all of human history, and he says elsewhere in the book of Isaiah, I am the Lord, that is my name, I will not give my glory to another. were my praise to idols.

This is the God we’ve come to worship this morning. This is the God into whose presence we have entered to hear him speak to us through his word. This is the God who holds every single aspect, every minute detail of our lives in the palm of his hand. This is the God before whom each and every one of us will one day stand.

And so, dear friend, let me ask you this question. God forbid, but if you were to die today and stand before God and He were to say to you, why should I let you into my heaven? What would you say? Some of you are familiar with that most important question. But put yourself for a moment in Isaiah’s shoes. Seeing what he sees and hearing what he hears, knowing what he knows, what do you think he would say? What’s Isaiah’s response?

Woe is me. I’m ruined. I’m utterly lost, as the ESV says it. For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips. And my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty. Whereas another translation puts it, woe is me, I am undone. There is no hope for me.” Which leads us to the second thing that this passage reveals to us about God. It’s not just God’s sovereignty, but it’s also God’s mercy.

Can you imagine what’s racing through Isaiah’s heart and mind? He’s thinking, there’s nothing I can do to hide who I am for Almighty God. I’m able just to quietly sneak out of this encounter with Him. God has the ability to know instantly and completely everything that’s going on. Every sinful thought, word, deed, and yes, even the motive of my own heart, which I do not always recognize. Do you understand Isaiah’s fear in the presence of a holy God?

Only those who are totally pure, that is sinless. can possibly stand in the presence of the true and living God, unconcerned about their own fate. For God hates sin. Every sin, as we know, the scripture tells us, is an act of treason. Every sin is an act of rebellion against His authority and His perfect rule. And here is a godly man, a prophet, a spokesman for God, readily admitting, What about you? What about me? Do we see ourselves as sinners?

One of the things as we’re preparing to go to Japan is in terms of understanding that language matters. Translation of words matters. The word for sin in the Bible has many of them. The primary word for sin translated in the scriptures is the word that the Japanese use for criminal. And so when you say, oh, or you ask the question, are you a sinner? The Japanese first mind thinking is, is, oh no, I’m not a criminal.

And so I have to say, well, you know, the scripture speaks of transgression. The scripture speaks as missing the mark, not being perfect. Those things very much resonate. with the Japanese, that they realize that in a culture obsessed with perfection, that they’re not perfect, that they’ve missed the mark. Sometimes in our culture, I think as well, when we say sinner, maybe we don’t think criminal, but we think of, oh, well, the big sins. You know, I would have done this, and I haven’t done this, you know, haven’t been in the paper, you know, for murder or all those other sorts of things. And so I must be okay. I’m just like everybody else.

We need to understand that sin is not about other people primarily. Sin is that which is first and foremost an offense against God. And so, even as the pastoral prayer was offered this morning, I had the chance to reflect on that, that sin in our culture is that which is self-assuring, self-satisfying, self-elevating. It’s a focus on ourselves. Try to live life independent from God. That is the nature of sin as it speaks into our culture. So people may not fully see themselves as sinners in the way the Bible uses that word. We need to explain it in a way that they can understand it.

There are things in the human heart that cause us to rely on anything or anyone other than God. And that is the nature of sin. And Isaiah is painfully aware of his sin. You know, as we think about that, and as this mercy that he’s going to receive here, I think he’s not the only person in the scripture that had a vision of God. Do you remember Moses? And what Moses asked of God, and we find this in Exodus chapter 33, then Moses said, now show me your glory.

And the Lord said, I will cause my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the Lord, in your presence. But you cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live. Then the Lord said, there’s a place near me where you will stand on a rock. And when my glory passes by, I will put you in the cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I pass by. And the scriptures tell us that the Lord came down in a cloud and stood there with him and proclaimed his name, the Lord.

And he passed in front of Moses proclaiming, the Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, bounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion, and sin. That was Isaiah’s only hope. As he stood in the presence of this God. It was his character. And that God is a gracious God. the mercy of God. This too is our only hope, particularly as one day we will stand in the presence of a holy and a righteous God, the Lord God Almighty.

And God’s forgiveness of Isaiah’s sin is symbolized in the burning coal taken from the altar, that altar that ever burns before the presence of God, and is placed on his guilty lips. by the angels. See, this has touched your lips. Your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for. God’s mercy is given to us also at our point of need. And God’s forgiveness of our sin, if indeed we have received it, is symbolized in the cross of Jesus Christ. That divine exchange where our filthy rags Because that’s what the scripture says we are, our deeds are in the sense, our filthy rags are exchanged for Christ’s righteousness.

We’re clothed in the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ. And this righteousness is received by faith. As Isaiah would say elsewhere, you know, all we like sheep have gone astray. We’ve turned to everyone, the Lord, everyone to his own way. And the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of our God, of us all. Our sin placed on Christ. Christ’s perfect righteousness imputed to us by faith. This is the message of the gospel. This is because of the mercy of God.

In the midst of everything else going on in our lives, all the struggles that we face in our families, perhaps, among neighbors or co-workers, even personal health issues, those sorts of things, if we know not that our sins have been forgiven, that our guilt has been removed, that we’ve been reconciled to God, our Creator and Redeemer, then we are without hope. But if these things have occurred, then we have great hope. And if it’s all these things going on, I trust that you have that hope. If not, I urge you to seek God with all your heart that you might experience that which God alone can give. Jesus put it this way. He said, Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

God gives Isaiah a vision of Himself, to cause Isaiah to reflect upon the sovereignty of God, that God is still on His throne, to remind him of the mercy of God, that God desires a deep relationship with Him, free from sin, and lastly, to reveal to him the calling of God, God’s unique place of service. to which we turn there in the text. Isaiah hears the voice of the Lord saying, whom shall I send and who will go for us? We often speak of this conversation between God and Isaiah as a calling of God to kingdom service or vocation. Often we think of it as a special calling and frequently use this passage to commission missionaries and evangelists and pastors and others engaged in church supported vocation.

But is God’s calling to service only limited to those situations? Let me say clearly, based on Ephesians chapter 4, certainly not. God calls every believer to works of service or ministry. God’s design is to have an army of grateful children involved in ministry. is serving where God has uniquely called and gifted them. Serving not out of a sense of obligation, but a privilege. And serving God by serving one another as part of God’s family, the Church.

Oftentimes, and again, our culture does a great disservice here. Theology doesn’t matter. We talk about going to church. You will not find that in the Scripture. We are the Church. We’re called to come and worship as the Church gathered. We’re called to go and serve as the Church scattered.

And so the ministry of the Church is much more than what happens as we gather for worship on the war site, as important as that is, and all the attention given to it. But the real ministry of the Church is the places we spend all the rest of the week, by God’s appointment, as God’s representatives, as His people, in those places that desperately need His presence, His light, His wisdom, His word, lived out before a watching world. That is the greater calling of the ministry of the Church, the worship and work of the Church, At least as one of the membership vows of PCA say, I don’t know if that’s the same as the same vow of the OPC. But the worship and work of the church, far beyond what’s in this building or even in this location, but it’s among God’s people.

And so as you look forward to whomever God would call as the next pastor here, he needs to be one who will equip you to do the work of the church in the places God has called you to be, all across this region. Because a church, a body of people that are faithful in doing that, God will continue to provide opportunities for and continue to use. We live in a culture that has tried to privatize and minimize the impact of the church. Confined it to a building, on one hour a day, and say, well, that’s where you people go. As opposed to what we call the salt and light. Because of what we’ve seen, what we’ve heard, but even more deeply what we’ve experienced by the grace of God.

What was Isaiah’s response to the calling of God to service? We don’t have time this morning to look at the difficult calling that he was going to be given. He was told on the front end, this is not going to go well for you. You’re going to experience great difficulty. What was Isaiah’s response? Here am I. Send me.

What’s your response to the calling of God to be actively involved in serving Him with your life? You and I have been saved from sin and death, but we’ve been saved to serve by the deeds of our life. Only one life will soon be passed. Only what’s done through Christ will last. You know, sometimes we make the mistake of thinking that God uses only leaders to accomplish his purposes. Not so.

You’ve been blessed by God to have Dan Knox as a spiritual leader in this congregation for over 30 years. Dan has faithfully served Christ and you well. Dan has shown his love for Christ by loving you. through all of the circumstances, over all that time, as Paul said to the Thessalonians, Dan and Pam, I hope can honestly say of you, you are our glory and our joy. Their lives have been poured out for you. I’m glad to learn of others who will benefit from his continuing ministry.

So in conclusion, let me ask you again, my friend, have you ever experienced a time of crisis in your life? A time of unrest, uncertainty, fear that literally the bottom will drop out. Ever wondered, where is God in all of this? Why does He allow this to happen? Why is He seemingly so silent?

If so, may God grant you a renewed vision of Himself that will cause you to remember that He is still on His throne. He still desires a deep and abiding relationship with you. and he wants you to fulfill your calling, his calling on your life through faithful service.

And for you as a congregation, as you pray and look to the Lord in 2019, let me encourage you with the following. Number one, wait on the Lord. He will not disappoint us. He is already working to prepare the way For a team of pastor and elders, servant leaders, He is sending and He is going to put together in His appointed time. As hard as it is, we must nonetheless wait on the Lord.

Secondly, be honest with yourselves and honest with each other and honest before God, even in prayer, about the struggles you may be having, particularly during this process of transition. Transitions are hard. Sometimes they bring out the best, and oftentimes, this side of heaven, they can also bring out the worst. So if there’s struggles you’re having, be quick to confess sins to God and to one another as you seek the forgiveness that He so freely offers and the forgiveness that we need as members of the body of Christ. God wants you to draw closer to Him now more than ever before. And this process of transition is actually God’s summoning to draw closer to Him. and then be active in doing what God has called you to do.

The true test of Dan’s leadership will only be seen now that he has stepped aside and others take their places. Dan Knox has completed the assignment that God gave him to do here at Grace School PC. Wise master builders do not build a ministry around themselves. It can be said of true servant leaders that when the great leader’s job is done.

The people will say, we did it ourselves. In the church, obviously, we don’t do it in our own strength, we do it through Christ’s help. But we are the church. No matter where we are, no matter the different seasons and transitions that God puts us through, as the Confession clearly says that God, speaking of the church, that God will always preserve a people for himself. to the praise of His glory.

Moses saw the Promised Land. Joshua and the people entered it. Elijah fought with the prophets of Baal, but it was Elijah and the sons of the prophets who reformed the spiritual life of Israel. The Apostle Paul planted the church in Ephesus, but Timothy and the elders pastored it. Jesus Christ gave the Great Commission. But His disciples, by the empowerment of His Spirit, have carried that out for over 2,000 years.

Do you know the exciting thing in all of this? God isn’t finished with us. And if we yield ourselves to the Holy Spirit, God will use even this time of transition to prepare us for new opportunities for ministry. As we think about all those things, all of our concerns, not just in the church, but also in our personal lives.

Let’s take this lesson from Isaiah. Let us keep our eyes fixed on our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, the King of Glory. Let’s pray together. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you for the one who it reveals. You, our Lord and Savior, Lord, we pray that in the midst of our circumstances, in the midst of our joys and sorrows, in the midst of our thoughts and aspirations, Lord, that you would be the center of them. And that in gazing upon you, and in listening to you, and in seeking you, Lord, we might experience the blessing that your people throughout all the ages have experienced. How blessed are those whose God is the Lord. And so it’s in your name we pray. Amen. I invite you to stand in response. Hymn number 700, Trust and Obey.

The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.

January 6, 2019
The Way and the Life

About this sermon

“Comfort, comfort my people, says your God.” Isaiah 40 announces that Jerusalem’s warfare is ended and her iniquity pardoned, and a voice cries to prepare in the wilderness a highway for the Lord, who comes himself to save his people. God’s first answer to his people’s deepest problem is always the forgiveness of sin, and the coming King then levels the valleys and mountains. Knowing Christ in his first coming, his people work as ground-levelers who bring peace where sin has done damage, while they wait for his return.

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Sermon transcript

Let me invite you to turn with me to the Gospel of Isaiah. That’s not a mistake. The Gospel of Isaiah, chapter 40, verses 1 through 11. We’ll primarily be considering verses 1 through 5, but we’ll read the whole introductory unit versus one through 11 Isaiah chapter 40. And with first one. Comfort, comfort my people says your God.

Speak tenderly to Jerusalem and cry to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins. A voice cries, in the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord. Make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low. The uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh will see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

A voice says, cry. And I said, what shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all its beauty is like the flower of the field. The grass withers, the flower fades, when the breath of the Lord blows on it. Surely the people are grass. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever.

Go on up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good news. Lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good news. Lift it up, fear not. Say to the cities of Judah, behold your God. Behold, the Lord God comes with might and His arm rules for Him. Behold, His reward is with Him and His recompense before Him. He will tend His flock like a shepherd. He will gather the lambs in His arms. He will carry them in His bosom. and gently lead those that are with young. This is the word of the Lord. Let’s pray together. Father indeed, this is your word. We want to hear it as it is. A word from you.

So would you give us eyes that see, that behold wondrous things out of your law. Ears that hear what it is you’re saying to your church. and hearts that are indeed set to obey all that you command, all that you call us to be and to do through your word. So Lord, illumine our hearts by your spirit so that we can indeed see these as words of life, not as dead words of the law. Transformative words that convict us, that persuade us, that convict us in the depths of who we are, like that sword that pierces asunder even to the dividing asunder of bone and marrow and discerns the thoughts and the attempts of our hearts.

So as it is, so do Lord in Jesus name. Amen. And when we look at the thrust of scripture, what we see Or one of the things we see, one of the big things we see is that God’s promises are the thing which propels everything else forward. God says, I will do this. And he does it. History is arranged and moves forward on the basis of it.

Promises are the reality by which God’s people live. We don’t live on the basis of what we see, but by what God says. It’s his promises, God’s promises, not human perceptions that direct the world and everything, that govern it. Promises are the thing that provide ballast, actually, for believers. As one author says, promises are, they create a small sanctuary of trust within the jungle of unpredictability. we hold on to what God says, even though reality might suggest everything contrary to what he has said. In this well-known passage, this is a passage that’s taken up in song by many authors, I guess specifically, or most known, renownly, by Handel, this passage is a promise of God.

It’s a promise of restoration. And there are three aspects I want to take a look at from this, from this promise of restoration. This restoration that happens through the arrival of God himself back to his people on the earth. Three things, three aspects of it we should say. Let’s look at the problem that it actually solves, that this restoration, this promise of restoration solves. The problem that it solves, the person, who solves it, or saves, and finally, the program that it enacts. So this promise of restoration gives us a little glimpse into actually three big aspects that actually are filled out throughout the rest of Isaiah, and of course, throughout the rest of Scripture. Those three things, the major problem that it solves, the person who solves it, through such saving, and the program that that one who saves enacts.

So let’s take a look at those in turn, the problem that it solves. We hear this voice crying out in the second part of verse two says the Lord says, cry to her, that her warfare or hardship is ended. That her adequacy is pardoned. that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins.

This cry of comfort that announces and begins this major section of the book of Isaiah is coming to the people who would yet, not at the time of writing, not at the time of receiving this, but who would yet actually feel the full fruit of their failure as God’s people. Worse than being just refugees in a hospitable host nation, they were people who were actually going to go into exile in a hostile land and suffer for generations. In this state of affairs, the hardship, the exile, the captivity would be something that would come about directly from the hand of God himself. And it’s like God isn’t acting or wouldn’t act jihad against his own people. That is what yet remains for them to experience when these words came to them. And the reason for it is very straightforward. Why would they suffer such cataclysmic catastrophe at the hand of God? The reason is very straightforward.

Their sin. It was the sin of the people. And it’s spelled out for us in Jeremiah chapter 25 verses 8 through 12, where it is announced that Nebuchadnezzar, that wicked wild King from the North was going to come and make desolate the people of God and take them away for 70 years for judgment. and all of that because of their sin.

Now, I know a lot of people think, you know, why don’t you just talk about sin so much? What is your people’s problem? Why don’t you just talk about our sins? And I think it was Charles Spurgeon, I’ll have to track this down, if somebody knows, let me know, who upon having a brief conversation with a woman who said that to him, you know, why do you talk about sin so much, said to her, Sounds like Charles Spurgeon Lake.

Well, when you stop sinning, I’ll stop talking about sin. Their biggest problem, people of God, their biggest problem was the biggest problem of our first parents. And it’s still our biggest problem. Our most fundamental issue is sin. The problem of sin.

I sincerely suspect that no Israelite, no Northern Kingdom member, thought to themselves as they were going through life that it would be their particular sin, collective with all the other people, that would bring about the severity of judgment that they were to experience.

I sincerely doubt not a single one of them thought to themselves, what I’m doing now will result in our whole nation being uprooted, moved out to another place, where we will see our king, Zirkaia, get his eyes poked out, and dragged off, and our wall, our mighty wall, battered and busted down. And we carried away in stages. I sincerely doubt not a single one of them thought that. And the reason, I work with a lot of guys who are drug addicts and alcoholics.

And not, you ask any one of them, not a single one of them ever thought that that first hit on a blunt they took at 15 years old. would lead to a life of completely destroyed relationships, utter poverty, and inability to stop doing it. Not a single person enters into sin wanting, desiring, or even seeing where it ultimately will take them.

Sin always takes us where we don’t want to go. The oak is in the acorn of sin. It always aims for the highest, as John Owen says. It aims to destroy, not just bring temporary delight. And so I sincerely doubt any single Israelite thought that the result of it would be what they actually experienced. I love how our confession starts with sin. It talks about the subtlety of the serpent. appealing to and deceiving Eve. It was the subtlety of sin. It starts in this small way and look at the complete cosmic disaster that subtle temptation and deception brought about to us today.

There was a movie a number of years ago called Max and it was about young Hitler not full-blown pathological maniacal Hitler, but young art student Hitler in Vienna. And the premise of the movie is simple. Hitler became a maniac because he was a thwarted artist, is the point of the movie. It was his inability to deal with the lower levels of frustration and sin that led precipitously to him becoming a maniac.

I love how the reviewer says it. Here’s what she says. She says, He wasn’t born a monster or spawned a monster. He actually decided to become a monster because he tried becoming an artist and found that becoming a monster was easier. The movie isn’t about Hitler’s great crimes. The audience knows all about them already. This is about his small sins, his emotional cowardice, his relentless self-pity, his envy, his frustration, the way he collects and nurtures offense. I think she’s on to something.

Whether or not that is true, it is definitely true that sin always is aiming for the highest. That a frustration can turn into murderous rage. That the collective sins of the people of God over time resulted in God dealing with them in such a colossal kind of way as he did through Babylon, right? Little disobedience leads to big disaster.

But it’s actually the focus of this passage isn’t specifically on the abiding problem of sin so much as the promise and solution in salvation. It’s an announcement of comfort and pardon for sin. God’s relentless commitment to his people, people, he says, he calls my people, verse one, comfort, comfort, my people, his relentless commitment to them in that he’s determined to pursue and to deal with their biggest problem. He doesn’t, his promises are not going to fail to his people. And so he promises to pardon them. That’s why the announcers, this messenger, whoever it is, announces this wonderful message of comfort. That threefold message. Their hardship, their warfare is over. Or would be over. Their iniquity would be pardoned.

In this wonderful word that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins. You read Job, the end of Job, you read Isaiah 61, 7, and double after talking about sin usually refers to a double blessing, a double benefit, not a double punishment. And so if that’s indeed the case, this is a wonderful picture of grace, the pardon of grace, that God’s pardon doesn’t take us from negative 10 to zero and just get us to break even. But we’re taking from negative 10 to positive 10. Where sin abounds, grace does much more abound. That God’s forgiveness overwhelms sin.

It doesn’t just neutralize it. Bring us back to basics. She’s received double. The promise of forgiveness or the promise of restoration here of God’s people. It’s always first and foremost, the promise of forgiveness of sin by our heavenly father, this God who keeps covenant, who keeps his word. It’s always first and foremost is dealing with our sin by pardoning, by forgiving us in Christ. There’s a little account. in one book, and it’s citing one part of a Hemingway short story.

And it’s a story that deals, or there’s a part of that story that deals with this Spanish father who decides to reconcile with his son who had run away to Madrid. And now, remorseful, that father takes out an ad in the El Liberal newspaper. And here’s what the ad says. Paco, meet me at Hotel Montana noon Tuesday. All is forgiven. Papa. So he took out. And when the father goes to the square, he actually finds 800 young men named Paco waiting for their fathers. All right.

Forgiveness. It is a pressing need, obviously, because forgiveness is our biggest issue. Theologically and often socially. This is the first thing addressed in restoration. Is our sin. And it’s addressed by the promise of salvation from sin. I love how one scholar puts it.

He says, if God had perceived that our greatest need was economic, he would have sent an economist. If he had perceived that our greatest need was entertainment, he would have sent us a comedian or an artist. If God had perceived that our greatest need was political stability, he would have sent us a politician. If he had perceived that our greatest need was health, he would have sent us a doctor. But he perceived that our greatest need involved our sin, our alienation from him, our profound rebellion, our death, and he sent us a savior.

And that’s exactly who we see revealed after this announcement of pardon, of forgiveness, of a cessation of warfare and hardship. We see not just the problem that’s solved, but the person who actually solves it and saves us. by saving, voiced in verse three, right?

This voice cries out. In the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord. Make straight in the desert a highway for our God. You see wilderness language, you see desert language, and it immediately evokes Exodus. How will we be delivered out of this exile? in the wilderness, in the desert. Well, it’s the Lord who comes and delivers. Make a path ready. Make the way clear for his arrival. He’s the one that will lead us out or lead us through. And out of this exile, out of this imprisonment, it’s the Lord.

And what is interesting is the way in which the language of the way is taken up to talk about the way is to talk about a pattern of life really a way of living. In fact, you see in first century and in Second Temple Judaism, you see the communities, these little Qumran communities, who develop the rule. And they say, this is the way we live. And they develop, and they talk about different ways to be holy, different ways to live. And the scripture employs the language of the way.

There is a way that seems right to a man, but the end thereof is death. And of course, Jesus takes up specifically this language of the way when he says and announces that he is indeed the way, the truth and the light. He is the path to God. He’s not just God himself come in the flesh. He’s the means by which we come to God. He is himself the way. So it’s not just to talk about what we do when we talk about the way, but to talk about what and who he is, Christ. He is the way, the path of pardon and restoration to the way things ought to be out of the wilderness, out of exile, out of the desert, goes directly through him and only him. And you know, it is the way. It is not one of many ways.

To talk about the exclusivity of the Christian gospel I know is heresy in our day. People do not like it. Why do you people think you have the truth? And what’s interesting is when people exclude our message of exclusivity, they are by nature, they are, you know, being exclusive themselves. They’re actually doing the very thing that they accuse us to do. When they say that your exclusive message, we’re excluding your exclusive message. Wait a minute. I thought you were opposed to exclusivity. You’re excluding our message.

They’re actually contradicting their own belief system. But what’s interesting, you know, we talk, since Christianity is indeed a lived reality, it is a way It has a pattern of life intrinsic to it. That means it can’t solely be known by investigating its intellectual claims. You actually have to see what it looks like. You can’t just sit around and make abstract arguments about veracity and coherence of it. You actually have to see it.

I think and believe that one of the best ways to show the truth of Christianity is to invite people to actually come on the way with you. There is a sense in which belonging a bit happens before believing. Invite people. Let them see your pattern of life. Let them see the actual change that happens because you believe Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. It’s far more than some system of truth.

It is actually a living faith in a person, in the God-man who has come to us, savingly, who has shown us the way. And so, it’s got skin on it. It’s not just ideas. It’s got bones and flesh that can be seen. So invite people to belong a bit to your life, your family, the community, so that they can see and hopefully by the Spirit come to believe.

And what we see next and finally, Not just the person who saves the Lord Himself who would come down. It has come. And we see clearly on this side of the cross who it is. This is Jesus. We actually do see something that actually happens to people. We actually see what this looks like amongst the people of God who are here. There’s a program that it starts. It doesn’t just reveal to us the Lord. enacts this program. We see it in the latter part of verse 3 and 4. What’s the message? The King is coming. The Lord is coming. The message is prepare the way.

Verse 3. Make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up and every mountain and hill be made low. The uneven ground shall become level and the rough places a plain. There’s two aspects of the program that this enacts.

All four of the gospel writers, when they saw this passage, Isaiah chapter 40, verse 3, all of them saw in that the ministry of John the Baptist. They said, when John the Baptist came and he was preaching, they said, this is Isaiah 40, verse 3. What this man is doing is embodying the truth of that promise of restoration. And what was John the Baptist? message. You find it in Mark chapter 1 verse 2 and 3.

You find it in John 1.23. The message was simple. REPENT! REPENT! They saw in the promise of restoration, in the words, prepare for that, prepare for the coming. They saw in that personal repentance.

If you’re going to be in the presence of a king, you have to make yourself befitting of the presence of a king. None of us would be what a great dignitary with a t-shirt on and torn up jeans. We would put on proper clothing. So it is with the king who comes.

To prepare is to turn from our ways. Take off the old road, the old clothing, the old way. and put on robes of righteousness. Personal change. We turn from the old ways as we’re renewed. And we put on Christ. Leo Tolstoy famously said, everyone thinks of change in the world, but no one thinks of change in himself. Well, in this program, this program of restoration and the Lord’s coming, You get changed at the personal level. Paul has lots of wonderful language about this. You become a new creation in Christ.

We’re different. We’re made new. We were participants in the kingdom of darkness. We’re now translated to the kingdom of his dear son, light. We walk in light. Paul says we are God’s work of art being remade, according to the purpose of one who has called us. We are his workmanship, which God has created and has foreordained good works that we would walk in. We are changed at the personal level.

What does it look like? This passage, what does restoration look like? It is not less than people of a repentant faith following, readying themselves ultimately for the return of Christ, but following him here and now in lives of faith and repentance, turning away from our own ways and following him. So there’s that program. It’s personal preparation.

But there’s also this aspect of public transformation we see here. Ours is not a quietest way that we are only concerned with the motions of the heart or inner warmth. It actually breaks out publicly and changes our communities, our families. Wherever we are. You see that in this language. What happens when the king comes to town?

What do people do in preparation? They take rough roads and they smooth them out. Crooked roads? Kings can’t be jerking back and forth. You make the road straight. You can’t have a king going up steep hills and coming down on low valleys. So you level. You bring the hills and mountains down. You lift up the valleys. You make the built environment becoming of a king. You work at it. You personally prepare and transform, but then that affects the environment. Uneven ground gets level. Rough places are made smooth and plain.

Because God’s program of restoration in Christ doesn’t stay local to just our lives, still less the motions of our heart, but it reaches to engulf everything. We sing, he comes to make his blessings flow far as the curse is found. Where is the curse found? Everywhere. All over. Institutions, homes, relationships, our bodies.

And one of the effects of the king’s coming and preparation for his second coming is that his people become these ground levelers who work on things to bring shalom to where it has been vandalized. to smooth over rough places. This is what you see in the church throughout history. You see this ground leveling effect. The epidemic of the third century. I mentioned this before.

Christians weren’t just people who took care of their own. When these plagues would break out in the Roman Empire, they actually walked around in the streets, saw the people who were cast off by their families, and took them into their own homes at great personal risk to themselves. They were ground levelers. demonstrated self-donating love at great cost because people are dignified. Hospitals, when they expand it, it’s the work of Christians who value body and soul.

You don’t find any hospital with the name of an atheist on it. They all have Christian names. We’re ground levelers. The best schools in our country were started as preacher schools. Places to train people to go out and preach the gospel. Orphanages, you name it.

History is just littered with the testimony that Christians, in preparation for their Lord’s return, and as a community who knows him in his first coming, life, death, resurrection, and ascension, are ones who are ground levelers, who make the rough places plain. Everywhere Jesus is known as the way, people of the way have been those who lift up valleys and flatten mountains, who are agents of restoration. You know, it’s always this vital question when I think about this, that every church needs to ask.

And it was even prayed earlier in prayer, right? Think about Grace Church. What would happen if Grace Church were to just automatically vaporize and no longer be here? What value to Glenn Osborne, to Sir Wickley, to a particular, your locale, what value would, tangible value would be lost? I know the Spirit does secret, powerful work and that God is one who takes a few loaves and multiplies it to feed thousands. So this is not necessarily even just big things, but what value would be lost if grace just were to be gone? What ground leveling effect might cease.

And those kinds of questions, those are good questions to ask for every church, for every community, for every believer. To discern how the Lord is using his people, transforming them personally, through faith and repentance, and publicly transforming them through the actions and activities, the lives, of those repentant, believing people.

You know, restoration is a messy work. a couple years ago when my place, when a fire happened right next door that did damage to all four of the units in the building. When it happened, and I would hear all these restoration crews around early in the morning banging hammers and saws and sanders and putting chemicals on everything to kill the smell and to put new paint on. When they were doing all that work, all that noise and dust and this incredible invasion of privacy and waiting for stuff to dry, it actually hit me that the way to newness, the way to make something new, often means you have to kill a bunch of stuff. That construction actually requires a lot of controlled destruction. There’s a lot of tearing things down and pulling stuff out and breaking things to replace things. It’s not a simple process. But the hammer noise, the saws, the dust, that all of those things were the unavoidable currency of restoration of an apartment or a house.

That they were something that could not be avoided. And you know, similar in relationships. What two people are at odds? Friends, members, husband and spouse. In order for reconciliation or resolution of conflict to happen, someone has to absorb some pain. You have to be able to forgive wounds and hurts. A relationship will not survive where both parties nurse hurts and grievances and seek to exact payment for them. Someone has got to absorb and forgive and not pay back, not hold against.

Else relationships won’t survive. and the currency of restoration that you see here in this passage and throughout the actual remainder of the book of Isaiah. This restoration, the kind that solves the sin problem, that saves us, that enacts a restoration of things that will not, of course, be complete ultimately until Christ returns and he himself does it. fully and it removes sin completely. But the currency of that, the currency of that restoration, we know, is death. It requires death.

Verse five says, the glory of the Lord will be revealed and we’ll see it together. And what we know is that that glory, yes, it’s the Shekinah glory manifestation of God. where he shows up, often in a cloudy pillar, filling the temple with his presence, an audible voice. But we also know that that glory is seen in the bloody cross work, redemption work of Jesus Christ. His glory is seen there. The writer of Hebrews says, in the cross, Jesus was crowned with glory. The Gospel of John talks about the time of his glorification coming was the time when he would be offered up and lifted up before man on the cross.

We know that the currency of that, of God’s full revelation of his glory in a fully restored humanity, fully renewed world, the cost of that is the death of the God man. The death and resurrection. That is the one who has come as the way. That is what we participate in if we are one of these people to whom God speaks comfort and pardon and forgiveness. We are ones who see his glory revealed not just in triumphalism and power, but in actual work of going to the cross and being nailed to some wood and crying out the cry of dereliction. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? and being taken down with the crown of thorns, and was dead for three days. And rose again as a vindication that that was an acceptable demonstration of glory. That that was indeed the payment that brought about the pardon for his people.

We know that. It’s only those who actually know that and believe that who can understand, appreciate, and will experience the blessings of this full restoration. That is in process even now in the church, and ultimately will be completed in a time yet to come.

May the Lord help us to trust, to believe, to experience the joy, the comfort of this word of promise of a restoration Only he brings. Let’s pray together. Father, thank you for your word. We want to have the sense of it on our hearts. That then moves out to our lives. So do that, Lord. Blow away the dross. But whatever has been true, seal it to our hearts.

That we hear it and receive it by faith. In Jesus name. Amen. Let’s take our hymnals and we’ll turn now to hymn number 148, the Trinity Hymnal. Let’s stand together if you’re able. ♪ Comfort, comfort ye my people ♪ ♪ Speak ye peace, blessed our God ♪ ♪ Comfort, comfort ye my people ♪

The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.

December 16, 2018