Grace OPC Sewickley PA

Sermon Book: Isaiah

  • The Five Children

    The Five Children

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Isaiah’s Christmas Children” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, December 27, 1998.

    About this sermon

    Isaiah names five children, and God uses the figure of a child for a reason. Mahershalalhashbaz means ‘swift is the spoil, speedy the prey,’ and God stays with his people even as he judges their sin. In Matthew 18:1-4 Christ sets a little child in the midst of his disciples.

    More sermons from Isaiah · Browse all sermons

    Sermon transcript

    We begin our scripture reading this morning in Isaiah chapter 8. This is Isaiah’s prophecy, the 8th chapter. We are reading, beginning at verse 1. Hear the word of God. I’m reading from the New American Standard Version this morning. Then the Lord said to me, take for yourself a large tablet and write on it in ordinary letters. Swift is the booty, speedy is the prey. And I will take to myself faithful witnesses for testimony.

    Uriah the priest and Zechariah, the son of Jebarekiah. So I approached the prophetess. and she conceived and gave birth to a son. Then the Lord said to me, Name him Mater Shallau Hashbaz, for before the boy knows how to cry out, My father or my mother, the wealth of Damascus and the spoil of Samaria will be carried away before the king of Assyria. Again the Lord spake to me further, saying, Inasmuch as these people have rejected the gently flowing waters of Shiloah and rejoice in raising the son of Remeliah, now therefore behold the Lord is about to bring on them the strong and abundant waters of the Euphrates, even the king of Assyria and all his glory.

    And it will rise up over all its channels and go over all its banks. Then it will sweep on into Judah. It will overflow and pass through. It will reach even to the neck, and the spread of its wings will fill the breadth of your land, O Emmanuel. Be broken, O peoples, and be shattered, and give ear, O remote places of the earth. Gird yourselves, yet be shattered. Gird yourselves, yet be shattered, devise a plan, but it will be thwarted, state a proposal, but it will not stand, for God is with us.

    For thus the Lord spoke to me with mighty power and instructed me not to walk in the way of this people, saying, You are not to say it is a conspiracy in regard to all that this people call a conspiracy. and you are not to fear what they fear or be in dread of it. It is the Lord of hosts whom you should regard as holy, and he shall be your fear, and he shall be your dread. Then he shall become a sanctuary, but to both the houses of Israel a stone to strike and a rock to stumble over, and a snare and a trap for the inhabitants of Jerusalem. many will stumble over them, then they will fall and be broken, they will even be snared and caught.”

    Then turning over to Matthew’s Gospel, the 18th chapter, reading from verse 1, Matthew At that time, the disciples came to Jesus and said, Who then is greatest in the kingdom of heaven? And he called a child to himself and set him before them and said, Truly I say to you, unless you are converted and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever then humbles himself as this child, he is the greatest. in the kingdom of heaven.

    Let’s pray together now. O God, you have made it plain to us that our foes are great and seemingly innumerable, and that they are spiritual powers who emanate evil and wickedness. Father, we are acquainted with the same, even in our struggles with sin. But Lord, you have been gracious in saving us from sin. and delivering us, O God, even unto your righteousness. May we, Lord, with your word in hand, the veritable sword of the Lord, fight well in your power and in all of the armor that you have supplied, that we, your children, fight ourselves, the valiant warriors, in the cause of Christ, against evil. That, of course, coming to us even as we are conscious of that sin that has been a part of us, from which we are delivered by grace, even for your glory. We pray these things in Jesus’ name, amen.

    In Isaiah chapters 7-12, the so-called Book of Emmanuel, in Isaiah’s prophecy, we find an unmistakable, unavoidable concentration upon the figure of the child. We have five distinct passages over the course of these chapters in which the Prophet Isaiah sets before us the figure of a child. First, Isaiah’s very own son, Shir Yashub, by name, spoken of in chapter 7, verse 3. Then the enigmatic child Immanuel, from that famous text in chapter 7 verse 14. Third, Isaiah’s newborn son, the birth of this child described for us in the text that we read this morning, the child with the foreboding name followed then by the inexplicable glory child of chapter 9, verse 6, the one known as Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. And finally, but by no means the least, The child of chapter 11, verse 1, indeed the same child as that glory child of chapter 9, though now differently described, the branch from Jesse’s stem.

    Five presentations of the figure of the child, each presentation being prophetic. That is, each presentation speaking about the future of God’s dealings with his people. To be more specific, God in the figure of the child is pleased to convey the expansiveness of his plan. he is pleased to convey even the monumental transformation he intends to bring for the entirety of the world in its course of history. God’s big doings, his biggest come in tiny packages, the large, the immense, compressed into the small and the minute, into the figure of a child. God’s magnificent work of salvation, then, by which he changes everything, is brought about through and in a child.

    But why, why this concentration on the child. Why this choice of the figure of the child to convey God’s purpose and his activity? Well, of course we know, don’t we? Kids are so cute. They’re so cuddly. They’re so attractive in and of themselves. They draw attention. They even command attention. And they are so innocent.

    Well, no. No, God’s reason for concentrating on the child, his reason for choosing the child as the appropriate image, is not for any of these reasons that may interest the world. Why is it, then, that the child is appropriate for Isaiah, led by the Spirit, as he, throughout the course of these chapters, repeatedly puts before us, then, the figure of the child. Why is it, then, in the final analysis, that God chooses the child as that suitable vehicle in the effecting of his purpose? even to the point of coming to us himself in the form of a child. First of all, the child is a proper figure in the administration of that government of God’s kingdom, because the child speaks to us about new beginnings. Children and the birth of a child speak to us of the arrival of a new state of affairs, ask any parent.

    Nor does it matter how many children are in the family already. A new child in itself speaks about an altered environment. Things will be different. And inevitably, that altered environment is one that is filled with hope. Thus, the birth of a child is accompanied by joy. In actual fact, God intends the child to be the sign of the transition into the permanently altered state of eternal joy. and that affected, in and through, the last child, the ultimate child. The birth of the burial defense and this telegraphing to us the new beginnings which God intends for his people.

    But at the same time, And in the case of Isaiah’s Christmas children, each of the children he mentions is a sign which either implicitly or explicitly communicates God’s justice. and joy, yes, but here with Isaiah’s children, the child, if you will, and wrath. In the cases of the two children mentioned before, this child in chapter 8, Neher Shalal Hashbas, the communication along this line of justice in wrath is a bit more subtle. Shir Yeshuv’s name, chapter 7 verse 3, after all means A remnant shall return, and implies, to be sure, despite its jubilant message on the surface, a horrible devastation out of which the remnant will be gathered. So while it may seem as if the joy, the rejoicing are there graciously accompanying even this child, the first of the children mentioned, is this implied message of horrible devastation out of which the remnant must arise. The same can be said for the second child, Immanuel, chapter 7, verse 14. What compares, we might ask, with the positive meaning of that name Immanuel? It means God with us. No joy equals the joy of the people of Immanuel, the people who know, in keeping with that name, that God is with them.

    But you see, even this name implies a darkness. in which the light of the name then shines. It is specifically because God has not been with his people that his renewed presence, as symbolized in the coming of a child, means so much. But even more, if that were possible, it is God’s presence now which continues to mean so much to the people of God, particularly as they continue to face distress, threat, and manifest evil. And even the consequences of the same, namely death. Truly in the midst of a persistent unnerving reality, even as that reality testifies to God’s dealings with a wicked world, if not a wicked church, how comforting for those who truly believe to know that God is with them.

    Emmanuel. But were the message of God’s justice, yes, his wrath has been implied with the message of joy in Shir Y’shuv and Emmanuel, that message now becomes explicit and dominant in child number three. The account of the third child’s appearance is dramatic. The Lord, beginning at verse 1 in chapter 8, instructs Isaiah to write on a large tablet in easily readable letters the Hebrew words, Neher, Shalau, Hashbeth.

    These words meaning, swift is the booty, speedy is the prey, or as one translator has rendered it, quick loot fast plunder. With regard to this action on Isaiah’s part, the Lord then secures two witnesses, verse 2, Uriah and Zechariah, who validate what Isaiah writes regarding the circumstances of his actions in inscribing the tablet. Then, as if Isaiah’s inscribing of that tablet in verse 1 were itself prophetic of the prophet’s relationship to his wife, she, his wife herself, becomes the means of his writing the name yet again. Isaiah knows his wife, who now is described as a prophetess, verse 3, and she conceives and gives birth to a son. At the birth of the child, the boy is given the name that was written on the tablet.

    Verse 1. As if the child had been prophesied by the inscription itself. We are then told that the infant will not know how to call out the words, my father or my mother, before the Assyrians, the dreaded Assyrians, loot and plunder both Damascus and Samaria. Verse 4. The two cities, you may recall, that have set themselves presently against Jerusalem. However, the boy’s name will continue to have significance as the Assyrians, not content with the plunder of Damascus and Samaria, turn their gaze southward toward Jerusalem itself, verses 5 through 8.

    To say the least, this third child communicates the explicit and dominant message of God’s just judgment, his wrath upon his people, North and South alike. But as clear as this is, We must not be deaf to the message of joy laid within even this child. The message of God’s judgment may not have been all that clear in the first two children, because the message of joy was dominant. But here we come to the third child. and recognize fully that the message of judgment is there on the surface for all of us to read. But in seeing that message of justice, we might miss the message of joy laid within the child and his appearance.

    After all, this child also is a child. This child in his embodiment of Israel and Judah’s judgment is at the same time the son of Isaiah and Immanuel’s brother. And this is why verses 9 and 10. going on with the prophecy, this is why verses 9 and 10, in picking up on the name Immanuel, at the end of verse 8, go on to speak about the ultimate undoing of the heathen nations and their plans, those who stand against the people of God. and why these verses go on to speak about the ultimate vindication of God’s people so wonderfully then trumpeted at the end of verse 10 by a restatement in translation form of the meaning of Emmanuel’s name. For Emmanuel, God is with us.

    The judgment, yes, but also the joy laid within the child. But going even further, we can even discern such a positive note, as amazing as it may sound, in the story of this child’s birth, moving back to the beginning of the chapter. This is truly subtle. So you have to concentrate.

    You see, the pattern of the inscription, verse 1, the pattern of the inscription, sealed by the dual witnesses in verse 2, Then giving way to the content of the inscribed message in the birth of a child is the very pattern of the movement of God’s revelation as it courses history.

    Here is the movement from the Old Testament to the New and into the birth of Jesus Christ himself. the movement from an inscribed message, sealed by due witness, Are they priest and prophet? Are they law and prophet? Is that the significance of Uriah and Zechariah in the second verse? Are they priest and prophet, law and prophet, giving testimony and sealing the testimony of the inscription of the written record? And then that written record testified to by the priest and the prophet giving way to the birth of an actual child as the old, with its inscripturated record and its letter, gives way to the administration of Jesus Christ in the Spirit.

    Does this third child then, so much wrapped up in the message of God’s justice and wrath, also communicate the marvels of God’s activity in fulfilling his word and sending redemption, so that in the new day the tragedies and terrors of the old are truly set behind the people of God and they now live in His glory.

    You should remember though as you think of this and reflect on it in light of Christ’s very birth. That as we have worked with child number three moving from wrath to joy, we must also understand that in considering Christ, we will have to work from joy to wrath. You will not be permitted to forget it. The birth of Christ is indeed positive. What joy is equal to the joy that accompanies that birth?

    However, that birth also seals God’s judgment climactically upon a resistant, stiff-necked, hard-hearted people. And that very child, born as a sign of hope and joy, in his maturity becomes, in the words of the 14th verse of this 8th chapter, as God himself, a stone of offense and a rock of scum. But what is it about God’s ways that both houses of Israel, both Samaria and Jerusalem, find so offensive? What is it about God’s ways that both houses of Israel identify as such a stumbling block stumbling stone for themselves.

    It is here that we must be sensitive to the second reason why God chooses the child as the appropriate vehicle for revealing his plan and purpose. Yes, the child speaks about new beginnings, even that new beginning laid within the gospel, which see in their most pejorative and prophetic light tell us about God’s saving activity over against the darkness and termination of an old, decadent world. But the child also, as a child, says as much by its smallness. not just as it speaks to us about a new beginning, but as the child, as child, speaks to us about its smallness, its weakness, its vulnerability. The figure of the child in itself, then, by God’s determination, deflates the pumped-up estimation of self-important people. the child becomes a sermon to such people preaching God’s delight in that he proves his power through the meekest and the weakest means. In that way, there is no argument about whose power is power. If God chooses the vehicle of the child to demonstrate his power, there can be no question as to where the power resides. Who has the power?

    Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength, because of thine enemies that thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger.” Psalm 8 verse 2. The little things, the weak things, the insignificant, the dismissible, the vulnerable, God has chosen the weak things of the world. in order to set his power before the world. It is not because of your strength that you are redeemed. It is not because of even amoral strength that you are redeemed. It is because of your powerlessness Isn’t it interesting that as the Lord chose the child for Isaiah as the fifth instrument of instruction, concerning his eschatological ways, our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, does the same.

    For he places a child in the midst of his bickering disciples. They’re arguing about who is greatest in the kingdom, that is, who has the power. that now the child becomes the eloquent message to which Jesus then had commentary. Truly I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself as this child, he is greatest in the kingdom. Matthew 18 verses 3 and 4.

    And actually if you consider it, if you consider what Jesus has done and what he has said, Both points that we have been making in this sermon are made by Him, the point with regard to new beginnings and the point with regard to powerlessness and humility.

    Personal conversion is rebirth. Personal conversion is a new beginning by which you become a child and partake of the grand new beginning brought about in the gospel. But that this transformation for you takes place in your personal conformity to the figure of a child means that, as far as you are concerned, there is absolutely no question where the power has come from. And most amazingly of all, such power as is now visited upon you is in true fact located in the one who speaks to his disciples in this passage in Matthew 18.

    This one not only has the power and even the greatness as his own, he being the eternal Son of God, equal to the Father and the Spirit, but he has this power and this greatness because in keeping with the divine purpose, he himself became a child. Before you were called upon to become a child yourself and follow him, he became the child. So now it’s not even your strength in thinking it’s a bright and good idea for you to become a childlike child because that’s the root to power. No, no, no, no. Your experience of being a child is now found in him and through him. It is all of him. He, in becoming a child, also becoming the perfect expression of a child’s humble weakness and vulnerability, and that’s for you.

    If you sense then your grasp upon God’s new beginnings in Christ, together with your own expression of an appropriate humble weakness as inadequate, then I plead with you to turn to Jesus, who not only sets the child in the midst of the disciples, but himself became the child so that you might be led to glory, so that you might stand before your Heavenly Father, a true child of God. Isaiah’s Christmas children, intended for all God’s children. And aren’t you among them?

    Lord, the world would look at the prophet and throw up its hands and exclaim near confusion. Unfortunately, O God, many in your church would look at the prophet and do the same. But we ask, Father, that if you are gracious to us, we, looking at the Prophet and into his words, would see Christ. And because we see him, O Father, may we know that yes, the wrath is presented, but also your grace and the love of the gospel. And Lord, we who have known even the darkness, do we not also now, because of your workings in us, by which we have been made children, know the light? And are we not the children of light? Lord, we thank you for your work in our souls, which you shall perfect in our bodies even unto the resurrection of the dead, through Jesus Christ who has preceded us even in that. In his name we pray. 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.

  • God With Us in Distress

    God With Us in Distress

    This recording is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison archive, part of the “Isaiah’s Christmas Children” series, delivered December 24, 1998.

    About this sermon

    Immanuel means ‘God with us,’ and Matthew 1:23 applies the name to Christ. Shearjashub’s name speaks into Israel’s distress in Isaiah 7. God goes through our distress with us, and God unites his people to the coming child.

    More sermons from Isaiah · Browse all sermons

    Sermon transcript

    Tonight we begin our scripture reading in Isaiah chapter 7. Give your attention to God’s word. We begin with verse 1. Now it came about in the days of Ahaz the son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah the king of Judah, that reason A king of Aram and Pekah, the son of Ramaliah, king of Israel, went up to Jerusalem to wage war against it, but could not conquer it.

    When it was reported to the house of David, saying, The Arameans had camped in Ephraim, his heart and the hearts of his people shook as trees of the forest shake with the wind. Then the Lord said to Isaiah, Go out now to meet Ahaz, you and your son Shir Jeshu, at the end of the conduit of the upper pool on the highway to the forest field, and say to him, Take care and be calm, have no fear, and do not be faint-hearted because of these two stubs of smoldering firebrands on account of the fierce anger of Rezend and Aram and the son of Ramaliah. because Aram with Ephraim and the son of Ramaliah has planned evil against you, saying, Let us go up against Judah and terrorize it, and make for ourselves a breach in its walls, and set up the son of Tabeal as king in the midst of it. Thus says the Lord God, It shall not stand, nor shall it come to pass. For the head of Aram is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rezan. Now, within another sixty-five years, Ephraim will be shattered so that it is no longer a people. And the head of Ephraim is Samaria, and the head of Samaria is the son of Remeliah.

    If you will not believe, you surely shall not be established.’ Then the Lord spoke again to Ahazphan. Ask a sign for yourself from the Lord your God. Make it deep as Sheol, or high as heaven. But Ahaz said, I will not ask, nor will I test the Lord. Then he said, Listen now, O house of David, is it too slight a thing for you to try the patience of men, that you will try the patience of my God as well? Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, a virgin will be with child and bear a son, and she will call his name Immanuel.

    And he will eat curds and honey at the time he knows enough to refuse evil and choose good. For before the boy will know enough to refuse evil and choose good, the land whose two kings you dread will be forsaken.” Again, the Lord spoke to me further, saying, “‘Inasmuch as these people have rejected the gently flowing waters of Shiloah, and rejoice in Reza and the son of Remeliah, now therefore behold, the Lord is about to bring on them the strong and abundant waters of the Euphrates.’” even the king of Assyria and all his glory, and it will rise up over all its channels and go over all its banks. Then it will sweep on into Judah. It will overflow and pass through. It will reach even to the neck and spread, and the spread of its wings will fill the breadth of your land, O Immanuel.” And finally this evening, turning over to Matthew’s Gospel, the first chapter, beginning with verse 18.

    Now, the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph before they came together, she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit. And Joseph, her husband, being a righteous man and not wanting to disgrace her, planned to send her away secretly. But when he had considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, Joseph, son of David, be not afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child who has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sin. Now all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet. Behold, a virgin shall be with child and shall bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel, which translated means God with us.

    Our Father, as our minds may be filled with many things, we pray, Lord, that you would quiet us in order that we might concentrate upon you. And Lord, may all of us, yes, the young who seem to be so important to us at this time of the year, and we who are older, May we all concentrate on your word and give our full attention. May our worship here and the attentiveness that we give be such that these things are a blessing to us personally, but also, O God, may they prove to be a blessing to each one of us and all those who are close to us. We pray, Father, that to this end, even as the angels were fully attended, and the shepherds as well, as those who came before the Christ, so may we also, O God, even as we give our attention to your words, May this be true, Lord, for your people, in her worship services throughout the world, not only at this time of year, but throughout the entirety of the year. For we pray this in Jesus’ name. Amen.

    My encouragement to you is that you should not allow the size of Isaiah’s prophecy, lo, it’s sixty-six chapters, to intimidate you. At least intimidate you in the sense of forcing you to lay it aside and not consider it. Much rather, even the size of this prophecy should be an opportunity for you to develop spiritually, for you to exercise spiritually. My own prayer is that you would, in looking at the magnitude of this prophecy, consider as well the enormity, even the immensity, of God as he sets himself before you in what Isaiah sets down. My prayer is that the magnitude of the entirety of this prophecy would communicate to you God’s own immensity, before which you in your own sinful finitude would then appear to be as nothing. the greatness of God and the smallness of man.”

    Thinking of things in terms that Isaiah would wish to communicate to those to whom he writes, the greatness of God, the enormity of God, and the smallness of Judah. through Isaiah’s prophecy than at any time during the year should prove to be instructive, if for no other reason than the way in which this prophecy confronts us with God’s grandeur and our own corrupt insignificance. But possibly moving through this prophecy at this time of year is especially beneficial to us, since such an exercise may prod us towards the truly extraordinary and sublime dimensions of Isaiah’s message. After all, no one quite like Isaiah among the Old Testament writers sets before us the great balance between God in his sovereign glory and humanity in its full and fallen creatureliness. And at the same time, among the Old Testament writers, no one quite like Isaiah sets before the gracious divine enterprise whereby the exalted Lord of all eternity overcomes that great gulf between himself and his sinful creatures through a voluntary, even vicarious, humiliation on his part. A voluntary, vicarious humiliation intended and designed to save some, his chosen people, his elect, those we might even describe as his church.

    In the earlier chapters of Isaiah, the portion that catches our eye along these lines is that section which has come to be known as the Book of Emmanuel, specifically chapters 7 through 12. This section of Isaiah’s prophecy, as I’m sure you realize, gains its title from the name which appears for the first time in it at verse 14 in chapter 7, that famous 14th verse. The name also appears in the 8th verse of the 8th chapter, and we have read that verse as well this evening. You might note in that 8th chapter that The word once more appears, however, it’s in the Hebrew instead of the English of that tenth verse in the eighth chapter. But it is not simply the mere expressed mention of this name that characterizes this portion of Isaiah’s prophecy.

    For permeating the entirety of these chapters, chapters 7 through 12, is the meaning of this name, Immanuel. And that meaning, as you know, is God with us. In communicating this central thought, and this dominant theme and motif. We find notable about these chapters something more than just the mention of the name Immanuel and all that that name communicates.

    For we realize that in the initial instance, this name is introduced to us in a child at And that furthermore, throughout these chapters, there is set before us again and again the message which the Lord has for us through Isaiah, that message communicated to us in the figure of a child.

    It is in the figure of a child, then, that both the great gulf between the creator and the creature, think of it, in the figure of a child, that both the great gulf between the creator and the creature, as well as the inexplicable humility which God demonstrates in his dealings with man, are accentuated. It is there for us again and again, not just one figure of a child, but with repeated figures given to us throughout the course of this section in Isaiah’s prophecy. There are no less than five children presented to us in the course of these chapters. Although not always different children, to be sure, yet uniquely set forth, distinctly set forth, in what we find before us.

    In chapter 7, verse 3, we have the introduction of the first child for the section. It is one of Isaiah’s own children, a child by the name of Shir Jeshu. We have already mentioned, somewhat at length, the mysterious child, Emmanuel, set before us in the 14th verse of the 7th chapter, and we’ve read of him. In chapter 8, verse 3, we have another of Isaiah’s children set in front of us. This one with the very long and strange name, Meher Shalal Hashbaz.

    I have to practice that before I’m able to rattle it off for you. But these three children mentioned so far are then followed by the two blatant portraits of the Messianic child, the coming Messianic child, the glory child of chapter 9 verses 6 and 7, and then finally the shoot out of Jesse’s stem in chapter 11 verse 1. Now, in taking stock of these children, you must be careful with your appreciation. I say this because invariably when we look at a child, or at the birth of a child, we look at that child and the child’s birth in the most positive way.

    While it is true that joy does surround these children in their successive presentations by Isaiah, with each one we are face-to-face with a disturbing ambiguity. For accompanying the joy comes a certain dissonance, the terrifying and cacophonous sounds of chaos and disaster. In some way, that might not be inappropriate for a child after all. The introduction of dissonance and cacophonous sounds of chaos and disaster, even those that from time to time disturb disassembly.

    But what we are observing here is certainly the case for the first child, Shir Yishun. The boy’s name means, a remnant shall return. And it’s very important as you consider that child’s name, that you understand what is being assumed when that child’s name is given and when it is spoken. Isaiah is to take the boy with him, we read of it this evening, he is to take the boy with him when he goes out to meet Ahaz, the king of Judah.

    While Isaiah in his message offers hope to Ahaz and to Judah, In the midst of the current conflict in which he and that nation are involved with Syria and the ten northern tribes of Israel to the north, Jirshir-Jishu, this child of Isaiah, serves as a walking sermon concerning the distant reach that would inform and instruct Ahaz’s faith, and no less the faith of Judah.” You see, in the context, Isaiah preaches immediate deliverance in the present situation, but sheer Jeshu, by his name, he standing beside his father, proclaims to Ahaz a quality of faith that now must accept God’s word concerning a future distant debacle, a truly excruciating ordeal in which faith, if it be the type of faith which justifies, expresses the most serene confidence. such a faith as is in view, as it is proclaimed in this child.

    Such a faith is serene despite devastation yet to come, looming as yet on the horizon. Such a faith is serene even as devastation comes and registers its most severe loss. Shir Y’shuv is a walking prophecy of the yet coming devastation of Judah, a devastation that is not going to come at the hands of the Syrians, at the hands of the ten northern tribes, or even at the hands of the Assyrians, but far distant, coming through the hands of the Babylonians, and that’s because of Jehovah’s judgment. And in that context, Shir-Yeshu becomes a working prophecy of the gracious salvaging by God for himself of a remnant. A remnant shall survive.

    It is specifically this kind of faith that is now challenging Ahaz and is challenging Judah through the prophet Isaiah and his son. It is the kind of faith that reaches out to the distant future and grabs hold of that future despite all the horrors and terrors that that future may hold, and vindicates God in the midst of it. It is a faith that latches hold of the future even in terms of the future’s extremities, and then works backwards into the present circumstance. You see how most people have it all wrong? The faith that they’re looking for is a faith that nearly satisfies them in the immediate context. that is helpful for them in the present situation, that enables them to cope right now, moment by moment. But the faith that is being held out before Ahaz here is a faith that grasps hold of the distant future of Judah’s history. and calls him to believe in the God who will preserve for himself a people even though the land is lost and the people themselves go through a horrifying judgment. Do you see how Biblical faith works? how this faith that is being preached by Isaiah and in the child, Shear-Jeshub, works. It reaches out to the distant future and then sees all present circumstances in light of that future, because you see, all the important and ultimate matters have been resolved and settled.

    I’m terrified about losing my job because in the final analysis, I’m afraid of death. If you do not have a faith that reaches out to the conclusion of the matter, even dealing with the most severe loss, you do not have the biblical faith. What I’m suggesting to you is that nothing less than what is in view here in Isaiah 7 characterizes the faith that you yourself as Christians profess. By this faith you are compelled to face the dissolution not only of your body and that reaching out to the ultimate, but the destruction of this world and the melting of its elements, according to Peter and his statements in his second letter.

    Has the gospel which you have embraced as the gospel which you have believed in, is that gospel granting to you such a faith that you know that not even your death, no, not even the dissolution or end of this world can rob you of your inheritance, which has been made secure for you in Jesus Christ, an inheritance that is laid up for you in heaven, reserved for you there? is the faith which you profess at this time of the year, the faith that characterizes all of your days and will characterize your days till you die. That truly, just as there was a sheer Jeshua beside Isaiah, a remnant shall survive. In fact, it shall survive through death and the undoing of this creation. And if you have such a faith that justifies God in the face of such realities, then your faith is the justifying faith, sealed even by Christ’s blood and the Spirit’s work.

    But we move along. As verse 10 in Isaiah 7 says, the Lord spoke again to Ahaz. And in this further word, the second child, as you know, is introduced, this child Emmanuel, verse 14. The Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and you shall call his name Immanuel.” Again, the name means God with us.

    It should be clear to you from this context that this child is promised in the time of Ahaz and Judah’s current distress. In other words, this child is a contemporary child. one that was born in and lived in the late 8th century B.C. What is said here by the prophet is not, first of all, dealing with the distant birth of Jesus Christ. That is not its intention in the first order. The focus of the prophecy here, the statement, has to do with a child that was going to be born, presumably in Jerusalem, contemporary to Ahaz and to Isaiah in the context of the late 8th century B.C. He is to be born during the time of the threat of that alliance between Syria and the ten northern tribes of Israel, as they have joined themselves together against Judah. This child, by his birth and by his name, comes as a confrontation So, says Isaiah, on the authority of the Lord, comes as a confrontation to Ahaz’s arrogant, feigned piety.

    Although he had invited to ask a sign as deep as hell and as high as heaven, Ahaz begs off self-righteously and evasively by saying, I will not ask. nor will I test or tempt the Lord.” He sounds quite pious when he is anything but. For Ahaz knows what is in his own heart and mind. The Lord, regardless of what signs he might provide this king, is not Ahaz’s confidence. Instead, Assyria is Ahaz’s confidence. As Syria and the ten northern tribes have set themselves against Judah, Ahaz has not turned to the Lord, instead he has turned to us, Syria, for his deliverance. This is his oath. Whatever joy then we might attach to the birth of Emmanuel, that joy is surrounded then by the current threat but also by Ahaz’s wicked treaty with Assyria and the failure of his own faith.

    In the midst of all of this, Emmanuel does become a sign, functioning effectively in the distress that has overtaken Judah, overtaken Judah’s people. In fact, it is particularly this ambiguity that defines Emmanuel’s usefulness as a sign. He is a sign of God’s presence in distress. You see, you have to have the distress to appreciate God’s presence in the distress. Now, many of you are arguing with God because you believe that Christianity entitles you to a life without distress. There is no such thing. You see, Emmanuel is a sign of God’s presence in distress. God, in the sign, in Emmanuel, accommodating himself to the distress. That this is true specifically in what we find in this prophecy is borne out by the progress of the prophecy itself.

    Emmanuel will be born while the Assyrians and the Ephraimites, that is, the ten northern tribes, threaten. But he will live out his days even into the time of the assault of the Assyrians, which is coming. the very Assyrians to whom Ahaz presently turns for help, but who shall in turn turn upon Judah, making Judah their prey. This means, then, that this child, Emmanuel, will be alive during the days of the Assyrian invasion. When the Assyrians overwhelm the promised land in its its totality led by their general and king, Sennacherib.

    And neither Immanuel’s presence nor his name’s meaning will secure Judah or Jerusalem against this onslaught. Most amazingly, Immanuel himself, the child now growing up, will live through the onslaught. Emmanuel, the one whose name means God with us, will suffer because of the onslaught.

    Just how much we are to grasp, this is made evident as the prophecy continues into the eighth chapter, especially that eighth verse. in the eighth chapter, then the tidal wave of Assyria will sweep into Judah, it will overflow and pass through, it will reach even the neck, and the spread of its wings will fill the breadth of your lands, O Immanuel.” Immanuel, we thought, was a name that bespoke that which was positive, but here it is spoken of in the midst of that which is negative. Emmanuel himself bearing up under the judgment, bearing up under the onslaught, he himself experiencing the onslaught, the character of the faith generated by this child was the sort that remains adamant about God’s presence in the face of the nation’s destruction. But in Immanuel, we are equally instructed about God’s identification with his own cause, so that like the child Immanuel himself, he, the great God, goes through the ordeal also. The name is Immanuel. God with us in our distress, in the destruction itself. Do I need to draw out the significance of all of this for you? Is it not clear enough to you?

    The baby Emmanuel from Isaiah’s day, even the boy as he grows, the man as he matures, the one who carries that name will live through the coming ordeal, he will live through the coming distress, he will live through the coming destruction, the name itself preaching the hidden presence of God among his people. But this child, little Emmanuel, belonging to Isaiah’s day, of course, anticipates a child who, as a sign in the latter day, reaches fully the depths and the heights. This latter child is no mere human baby, symbolically bearing the name Immanuel, but a divine child, really and truly fulfilling that name. The new Immanuel is born to be is born to no mere maid in Judah, but miraculously conceived to a literal virgin.

    This one will live through and suffer in the life of his people in order that his people might live in him. He compels the faith of all of God’s people in order that they might know that God has actually taken to himself is people’s condition, human flesh, and is bound to us in our life in this world until that life is completely resolved by the glories of the kingdom of heaven.

    And thus, the enormity of God is matched by the enormity of his love. and that telegraphed to you in a child. Our Father and our King, we thank you, Lord, for the genius of your message to your people, and how beautifully and wonderfully, even in the pages of the Old Testament, and in what might seem to be the obscure messages of the prophets, the word of the gospel is declared. And how, Lord, we thank you that the day anxiously awaited by Isaiah and others has come, and that the arrival of this day means now that we are enabled to understand so fully So marvelous.

    The extent of your greatness. And the wonders of your life. Oh father we ask. That the lesson of the children in Isaiah. May register well upon us. And father we are asking. That the message of Emmanuel. would preach volumes. Lord, may we have such a faith as is prepared to receive the message, and may we receive it with gladness. We pray, Lord, that this may be to our good and to your glory. For Jesus’ sake, 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.

  • The High and Lofty One

    The High and Lofty One

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Isaiah’s Christmas Children” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, December 20, 1998.

    About this sermon

    Isaiah’s prophecy is immense and Judah is small. In Isaiah 57:15 the high and lofty One dwells with the contrite and humble. Judah’s sin fills 1:1-8, God’s surprising grace answers it in 1:9, and Isaiah turns again and again to the figure of a child.

    More sermons from Isaiah · Browse all sermons

    Sermon transcript

    We begin our scripture reading this morning with a verse from Isaiah chapter 57. Before we go back to Isaiah chapter 1, we start in Isaiah 57. I’m reading verse 15. Give your attention to God’s word. For thus saith the high and lofty one that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is holy, I dwell in the high and holy place with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble and to revive the heart of the contrite ones. The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz, 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 hath spoken.

    I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me. The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib, but Israel doth not know, my people doth not consider. Ah, sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a seed of evildoers, children that are corruptors, They have forsaken the Lord, they have provoked the Holy One of Israel to anger, they have gone away backward.

    Why should ye be stricken any more? Ye will revolt more and more. The whole head is sick, the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness in it. but wounds and bruises and putrefying sores. They have not been closed, neither bound up, neither mollified with ointment.

    Your country is desolate, your cities are burned with fire, your land as strangers devour it in your presence, and it is desolate, as overthrown by strangers. And the daughter of Zion is left as a cottage in a vineyard, as a lodge in the Garden of Cucumbers, as a besieged city, except the Lord of Hosts had left unto us a very small remnant. We should have been as Sodom, we should have been like unto Gomorrah.”

    In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphims. Each one had six wings. With twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly.

    One cried unto another and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. And the posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke. Then said I, Woe is me, for I am undone, because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. For mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. Then flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand. which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar. And he laid it upon my mouth and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips, and thy iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged. Also I heard the voice of the Lord saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I, send me.

    And he said, Go and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not, and see ye indeed, but perceive not. Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes, lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed.’ Then said I, Lord, how long? And he answered, Until the cities be wasted without inhabitants, and the houses without man, and the land be utterly desolate. and the Lord hath removed men far away, and there be a great forsaking in the midst of the land. But yet in it shall be a tent, and it shall return, and shall be eaten as a teal tree, and as an oak, whose substance is in them when they cast their leaves, so the holy seed shall be the substance thereof.

    Let’s pray together. O Lord, with your word, refresh us. And Father, grant your mercy to your people in the world, that they with us may be refreshed. But Father, we pray for the powerful effect of your word as well not only for us and your children, but among those who are being gathered. So we would ask, Lord, your blessing upon your servants who preach the word today, who preach it in places far off, even, that they may be empowered by your spirit, and that the effect of that proclamation may be marvelous. We ask, Lord, that we might pray with expectation and confidence that all of your purposes are being fulfilled.

    Oh Lord, we trust in you. Amen. Isaiah’s prophecy is remarkable in its scope. We stand in awe of it, if for no other reason, because of its sheer size. It’s sixty-six chapters. That size, like the size of the other two major prophets in the Old Testament, Jeremiah and Ezekiel, contains a message in itself. For this book, being of such enormity, communicates by its size the far reach of the divine purpose and the immensity of God’s very own person.

    By contrast, Israel is but a little nation. Even in its unified state, previous to the days of Isaiah, Even in its unified state, Israel is but a little nation. And even if Israel were to gain all of the territory to which it in ancient times aspired, and even in present times aspires, it would still be but a little nation. And what of Judah, that broken-off piece of Israel, that piece of Israel to which Isaiah speaks in his prophecy? This piece of Israel is a smaller nation still.

    But to this microscopic excuse for a country comes this immense monumental revelation. And in that revelation, nothing less than as if the ages, present and future, as if the universe, the entirety of the cosmos, in its most comprehensive consideration, were jammed into the confines, not just of this book, but of the nation itself, its boundaries and its history.

    Something like pouring an ocean into a cup. The size, then, of Isaiah’s prophecy is instructive. It is instructive by design, by intention. Its sheer size forces Judah to a consideration of her smallness, even as she considers herself against the background of the immensity of God’s plan. the sheer size of the prophecy, works in Judah, forces Judah into a humble reflection upon herself, if she is seeing things rightly. And that in light not only of the magnificence of God’s great design, but in light of God’s wonderful promise, the end of which is that through the instrumentality of this small, insignificant piece of real estate, the Lord is constraining the entirety of creation to move towards the new heavens and the new earth. nothing less grand than that. It will be this interplay between the minute and the monumental. between the comprehensive and the provincial, between the unobtrusive and the grand eloquent, that not just colors, but determines the doctrine, the theology, the message of Isaiah. from beginning to end.

    Nowhere does this receive such succinct, such compact and powerful expression as it does in Isaiah 57, verse 15, which we read as we began our scripture reading this morning. in the agency of the Lord himself, sets before us the self-identification of the Lord from the Lord.

    He is the one who is identified as the High and Exalted One. You’re reaching for the limits here. The High and the Exalted One, the One who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy. And this one says, I dwell in the high and holy place, but also with the contrite and lowly of spirit. Do you see the reach of it? And then the irony of it? The greatness and the magnitude and then the smallness I dwell also with the contrite and lowly in spirit, in order to revive the spirit of the lowly and the heart of the contrite.”

    Yohades Vash goes so far to say that this one verse, more than any other verse in Isaiah, expresses the fundamental burden of Isaiah’s message. the high and the low, the limit in the lofty extremes, and the most humble. The immense and the little. Compressed into this verse is what is laid within the fabric of the book of Isaiah as a whole. And what we find in the fabric of the whole finds itself expressed more expansively in other places in Isaiah. For instance, in that matchless passage, Isaiah 40.

    A passage which many of you have labored to commit to memory. You know the chapter. The chapter begins with those familiar words, Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God. And that chapter ends with the words, But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.

    And in between these two realms, at the beginning and at the end, we are reminded of the sinfulness of humanity, not just of the finiteness of humanity, but of the sinfulness of humanity. We are reminded of the sins of Judah and the repayment doubled for all of those offenses. We are reminded that all flesh is as grass, so says the Lord. And we are told, in comparison to God, all the nations are as a drop in a bucket, indeed all is nothing.

    But it is the God who sets himself forth here in Isaiah, no less in Isaiah 40, who is the one who gives power to the faint, to them who have no might he increases strength. In these latter chapters of Isaiah, the incomparable magnificence of this contrast between the infinite God and a finite, broken, and corrupted humanity is set forth finally for us in a solitary figure, in the figure of the Lord’s own faithful suffering servant, whose life is set forth for us in the famous Servant Songs of Isaiah, the most famous of which is Isaiah 53. This servant in his innocence adorns himself with lowliness. He chooses that lowliness. He takes to himself a contrition, and that for the sake of those for whom he is sent, those whom he serves. in order that these might, in the language of Isaiah 57, be revived, that is, born again, or that they might, in the language of Isaiah 53, be justified. The Lord shall see the prevail of his servant’s soul and be satisfied, for by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many, for he shall bear their iniquities.” Isaiah 53, verse 11. when the suffering servant finally, then, the great God, meets man in his lowliness and even his dismissible insignificance.

    But since, as Avos has said, Isaiah 57, verse 15, captures the prophecy as a whole, And this message is woven throughout, evident in the expansive statement of Isaiah 40. We certainly don’t have to wait, do we, until the latter chapters of Isaiah to catch the scent of the theme. That theme in the early chapters of Isaiah strikes home from the very beginning notes, and that in the most pointed way. be tempted to think, lest you be tempted to think, that in the scales measuring out the respective immensity of God and the dismissible gravity of the human race, that at least Judah is still of significant weight, then think again.”

    Isaiah, in his opening verse, identifies the Judah is in her heyday. Oh yes, she is a broken-off piece of Israel, but she is in her heyday. Not since Solomon had such strength and prominence been known within the territorial borders of the promised land, and that in the successive reigns in that eighth century B.C. of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah.

    But in the midst of such might and prosperity, the prophet Isaiah commands the heavens and the earth, in the first verse of his prophecy, to hear the Lord’s testimony against Judah. With the horrific judgment against the ten northern tribes already visible and certain, the Lord, through his prophet now, shakes Judah to the south with a vision of her coming devastation and that for her sin.

    We have read Isaiah’s account of Judah’s sin in verses 2 through 6 in that first chapter. We have read Isaiah’s vision of Judah’s coming devastation in verses 7 and 8. These opening verses strike at Judean pride. They tell of Judah’s demise in light of Judah’s pride.

    The demise of the two southern tribes, that is, and their capital city, Jerusalem, a demise that follows suit parallel to the destruction of Israel to the north, the ten northern tribes, and that capital there, Samaria. But now, in light of such proclamation, declaration of judgment, What then becomes of the significance claimed by Judah and Jerusalem? What of their supposed weightiness in the scales? A weightiness they imagined spoke favorably for them, even if God himself were placed in the balance.

    But Isaiah says, all sinful nation a people laden with iniquity, sons of corruption. Your land is desolate, your city burned with fire, your fields devoured by strangers in your presence, your country is desolate, overthrown by strangers, and the batter of Zion is left as a cottage in a vineyard, and as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, as a besieged city.” Now, you are mistaken if you think that there is some comfort in that lodge in the cucumber patch. You are mistaken if, in listening to these words from Isaiah, you think that they leave room for some form of hope. That is not their intention. They are framed in such a way as to leave Judah, if understood properly, with nothing.

    Nothing whatsoever for her own self-esteem to put in the scales, particularly as she would place herself in those scales with herself on one side and God on the other. it is precisely this point, the utter devastation and distress communicated by these opening words, it is precisely this point which makes the ninth verse so dramatic. For in this ninth verse, the Word Himself, according to His sovereign grace, according to his unexpected, surprising, sovereign grace. You are moving through the chapter, through the verses, listening to the indictment coming from Isaiah upon Judah. You are hearing the words of judgment and censure, and you’re not prepared for what you get in verse 9.

    It’s not as if there’s been a slip It’s not as if there’s been a falter on the part of the Prophet, or a lapse on the part of God Himself. The swift change from verse 8 to verse 9 is deliberate and intentional. It’s not the intrusion of a later writer, it’s not someone trying to inject hope into an utterly depressing passage.

    It is the vice used by the Lord himself in order that he might underscore his sovereign, unexpected, surprising grace.” As surprising as this verse is, so surprising is God’s grace. As unexpected as this verse is, so unexpected is God’s grace. as inexplicable as this verse is, so inexplicable is God’s grace. So that the Lord now, in the course of the diatribe, In the course of reading out the sentence and the judgment, according to his mercy, unexpectedly and surprisingly, tips the scale by preserving something in the balance opposite him where there should be nothing at all.

    It is in the face of such total annihilation the true Holocaust, if you want to know, that the Lord God, in his servant Isaiah, says to these Jews, except the Lord of Hosts, have left unto us a very small remnant. I love the King James. A very small remnant. we would have become as Sodom we would have been like unto Gomorrah. But admittedly now, I recognize this, the Lord’s point here is subtle.

    There is a certain air of ambiguity hovering over this text. In my interpretation of it, I have subjected it, you may say, to a certain reading, namely that verse 9, with this verse, the Lord means to accent His sovereign grace by preserving something where there should be nothing. I contend that this is the way the Apostle Paul reads this text when he quotes it in Romans 9, verse 29. However, at the same time, admittedly, and I recognize this, there is, as I said, an air of ambiguity.

    Might not this verse also be interpreted along the line that the reason the Lord leaves the is because the remnant in itself has value. That the remnant in itself has a residual, commendable strength. In other words, we could ask, with regard to this verse, is the remnant here in itself still something rather than nothing? It is this question that begs for an answer, and I suggest to you that that answer is graciously given to you in what follows in the course of Isaiah’s prophecy.

    The latter chapters of Isaiah so powerfully focus upon that solitary figure. who is the one who is set forth when no one else is sound, when no one else is sound who can stand. That solitary figure of the suffering servant, innocent in himself and separated from humanity generally. thereby in his person setting before us the stark contrast between God and his awesome holiness and humanity in its finitude and simpleness. But here in these earlier chapters, with their own special power and forcefulness, in a preliminary way, in a provisional and preparatory way, this same contrast is set forth but in its most immediate expression, not in one inherently innocent, as would be the promised suffering servant, but in one who himself by nature is corrupt and desperately in need of the Lord’s sanctification. I am speaking, of course, of Isaiah himself, who in his confession acknowledges that he has no business being placed in a comparative scale with the Lord.

    In the face of God’s glorious self-revelation to Isaiah in chapter 6, Isaiah cries out, “‘Woe is me, for I am undone! May be better, I am ruined, I am destroyed, because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips.’” The Lord’s preservation of Isaiah in Isaiah chapter 6 is no more by Isaiah’s merit than the remnant’s preservation in chapter 1 is by the remnant’s merit. And by way of extension, we can say that Isaiah’s preservation in chapter 6 is no more because of Isaiah’s native strength and weightiness than the remnant’s salvation in chapter 1, verse 9, is due to its collective strength and significance.

    Instead, the remnant’s salvation will be by way of the Lord’s strength and glory, God for his own glory being pleased to reveal his power and his splendor in and through the weakness and insignificance of those whom he calls to himself. And it is for this reason, that is, God’s interest in exalting His divine power and grace even through human weakness.

    It is for this reason that in the early chapters of Isaiah, Together with the presentation of this fragile remnant and the fractured prophet Isaiah, the prophet’s message gravitates toward the repeated presentation of the figure of the child. You will find in what follows Isaiah 6 repeated appeals by the prophet to the figure of the child, and that deliberately. It will be in the coming messages. that we will be looking at Isaiah’s Christmas children, successively set in front of us in chapters 7-11, children who each in turn speak to us about God’s greatness and goodness in contrast to human insignificance and unworthiness. It will be my task not only to properly identify these children for you, but to help you appropriately identify with them.

    Our Father, we may well have been overwhelmed by the size and magnitude of Isaiah’s prophecy, but Lord, with the size of that prophecy, there is also the magnitude of our God and the immensity of his purpose. And Lord, we pray that in considering these things, we would be impressed with the mystery of your workings, whereby you are pleased to bring praise and glory to yourself through that which is weak, through that which is even given over to destruction, so that in light of that destruction, the only way that hope can arise is if the Lord himself acts. Father, we trust you, for you have acted. You have acted for your people in manifesting your strength even in their weakness. We trust you, O God, because you have acted in and through your Son, who in the weakness of his crucifixion, and in giving himself over to destruction and death, You have revived him and brought him to yourself, exalting him to your right hand. Lord, we pray that as we consider Isaiah and his message, that even these things that are out in front of Isaiah would become clear to us as they are laid within his words. We pray this, Lord, to your glory.

    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.

  • A Remnant Shall Return

    A Remnant Shall Return

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Isaiah’s Christmas Children” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, December 20, 1998.

    About this sermon

    Ahaz faces Syria and Israel, and Isaiah prophesies into that crisis. Chapters 7-12 form the book of Immanuel, and its children carry the message. Isaiah’s son Shearjashub bears a name that means ‘a remnant shall return.’

    More sermons from Isaiah · Browse all sermons

    Sermon transcript

    give you attention to God’s word. This is Isaiah 7, verse 1. Now it came about in the days of Ahaz, the son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah, king of Judah, that Rezan, the king of Aram, and Pekah, the son of Ramaliah, king of Israel, went up to Jerusalem to wage war against it, but could not conquer it.

    When it was reported to the house of David, saying, The Arameans had camped in Ephraim. His heart and the hearts of his people shook as trees of the forest shake with the wind. Then the Lord said to Isaiah, Go out now to meet Ahaz, you and your son, Ashur-Jeshub, at the end of the conduit of the upper pool, on the highway to the fuller’s field, and say to him, Take care and be calm. Have no fear, and do not be faint-hearted because of these two stubs of smoldering firebrands, on account of the fierce anger of reason and Aram and the son of Remeliah. Because Aram, with Ephraim, and the son of Remeliah, has planned evil against you, saying, Let us go up against Judah and terrorize it, and make for ourselves a breach in its walls, and set up the son of Cabele as king in the midst of it.

    Thus says the Lord God, It shall not stand, nor shall it come to pass. For the head of Aram is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rezan. Now within another sixty-five years, Ephraim will be shattered, so it is no longer a people. And the head of Ephraim is Samaria, and the head of Samaria is the son of Remeliah. If you will not believe, you surely shall not be established.

    Lord, we thank you for every reminder of your son’s birth. And Father, as your people, those who are zealous to confess you, we ask that as we are reminded of the birth of your son, that our minds might be kept clear and that our hearts would be pure. Father, the world is drawn into the celebration, and Father, we know that even this has its ironic twist, that those who do not know you or confess you are seemingly compelled to acknowledge you and the greatness of your Son. But Father, we would not be deceived by all that sparkles, all that distracts, all that catches our eye.

    Instead, Lord, our souls would be fixed upon Christ himself, your gift to us. Help us therefore, O God, by the way we conduct ourselves, to be those who testify in keeping with the words that are given to us, keeping, O God, with the opportunities that present themselves. O Lord, help us to be an evident testimony to the graciousness of our God and the wonder of Christ. Bless us, Lord, even at this time of year, and, Lord, may we not allow our hearts and minds to run away with us into all kinds of sentimentality, but may we be content, O God, to be fixed with the confession of our faith and the glories of Christ. We ask this through Christ. who lives within us.

    Let me try this evening to give you a feel for what is going on here in Isaiah chapter The year is 740 B.C., or thereabouts. Judah’s great king, Uzziah, has died, and with his death there has also come the death of a long period of peace in the experience of the people of Judah. In fact, both Judah You know your geography and something of the history of the people of God. Both Judah to the south and the nation of Israel to the north, the two southern tribes, the ten northern tribes, split by civil war after the reign of Solomon. had at this particular time enjoyed nearly fifty years of freedom from massive external assault. If you know anything about life in the ancient world, that was certainly a blessing.

    Syria, to be sure, was a nuisance, a disturbance. But now, on the horizon, rose the imposing predator, the Assyrians, who had been called by some the Nazis of the ancient world. To a succession of impressive leaders, Tiglath-Belizer, that is the third. Don’t you love the names? They’re even fun to say. Shalmaneser the fifth, Sargon the second, and of course, that most formidable of all, Through a succession of impressive leaders, the Assyrians had campaigned in the interests of their superpower mentality.

    These Assyrians weren’t your ordinary land-grabbing marauders, you know, the rape-and-pillage They set their sights on more than the proverbial spoils of war. Their interest was world dominance, which they advanced through a systematic program, a program uprooting entire nations. That was their method. A method that meant the transportation of the inhabitants of the defeated nations, and then to ensure power and their rule of law, the swift and immediate reprisal for the faintest hint of rebellion. And I mean swift and immediate. Assyrian power has been described as hideous, for the Assyrians were exceedingly cruel.

    About five years after Uzziah’s death, that death mentioned for us at the beginning of Isaiah 6, if you will recall, With Ahaz, his grandson, now on the throne in Jerusalem, distressing news shakes the Judean world. It seems that Israel, those ten northern tribes, have united with Syria, the nuisance, in an effort to block the advancing deluge from Assyria. in the minds of both the Syrians and the Israelites, those described as Ephraim, it only made sense that Judah should tag along, join them in the stand. The thought was that these three nations, and possibly some other lesser nations, as could withstand the Assyrian assault. But what shocked the Judeans was word that the Syrian-Israelite coalition was so distressed by Judah’s refusal to join in their alliance that this coalition now set its sights upon Jerusalem itself.

    Ahaz, in this situation, a very proud man, acted seemingly as if, well, what’s the problem? when in actual fact he was internally stumbling and looking for a solution. The king is as terrified as the people, so what does he do? He turns to the Assyrians, those cruel people which the Assyrians and the Israelites had hoped to stop.

    This then brings us up to date with Isaiah 7. When Judah refused to help, the Syrian-Israelite coalition invaded the land of Judah with the objective of placing their own man, the son of Kabil, on the throne of Jerusalem, and that individual is mentioned for you in the 6th verse of the 7th chapter. for what we have read in the seventh chapter.

    But it might also be helpful to set the stage theologically. As we said this morning, Isaiah is the prophet of divine grandeur, and that specifically in relation to, and even in contrast with, human weakness and vanity. the magnificence of God and the puniness of man, the greatness of God and the littleness even of Judah and those who inhabit it. This message is variously communicated throughout the prophecy from Isaiah, and that in such a way that even Judah, for all of her advantages, She is, after all, living in the shadow of the temple. She is living with the planes of David there, hovering over the city of Jerusalem and securing the people within the land which they believe has been promised to them. Even Judah, for all of her advantages and all of her supposed reasons to boast, are put in their place.

    For here, in light of this stark contrast, the immensity of God and the smallness of man, is portrayed for us a universal devastation that reduces man, reduces humanity to nothing, to utter desolation. Meaning, of course, that if there is anything to be salvaged, if there is anything to be saved, God himself will have to act. For man does not have it in himself, even in what he is as a creature, much less what he is as a fallen creature. to save himself. God’s salvaging activity, sovereign and gracious, God’s salvaging activity has been variously presented throughout the prophecy of Isaac. at the very beginning of the prophecy and throughout the early chapters, that salvaging activity repeatedly turns to the very small remnant of which the Prophet speaks.

    If Judah is little, the remnant is littler. If Judah is insignificant, then the remnant is even more insignificant. Judah dismissible, the remnant even more dismissible. But at the beginning of the prophecy of Isaiah, and throughout those early chapters of Isaiah, you will find the Prophet repeatedly referring to the remnants, so wonderfully identified in the first chapter of Isaiah, at least according to the King James Version, as that very small remnant. Not saved by its own merit, nor by its own strength. The remnant doesn’t even have the wherewithal to form, out of its number, an army.

    And at the end of the prophecy, what can we say about the way things progress at the conclusion of the prophecy, specifically with reference to the famous suffering servant figure set forth for us there. That one who takes to himself the weakness and the fallenness of his people and bears in his body the judgment that they deserve.

    But you know from this morning’s message that God’s salvaging activity will also be highlighted in the prophet himself, in Isaiah, personally. And that’s why Isaiah 6 is so significant. For here you have the confession of one who stands in privileged position within Israel, within Jerusalem, within the temple.

    He is brought right within the sanctuary, and as he is confronted with the vision of God in all of his glory, in all of his magnificence, he is constrained to cry out, Where is me? For I am a ruined man. I am distraught. A man of unclean lips, living in the midst of a people of uncleanness.

    This unworthy man then, in keeping with God’s salvaging activity, his saving enterprise, becomes a conduit of God’s holiness. God’s salvaging activity is also powerfully presented for us as we launch into chapter 7, is powerfully presented to us in the figures of a number of children. It is now becoming as profound as it is sublime. You have Judah, you might imagine strength for her, you have the remnant, you might even be able to conjure up strength for the remnant in thinking about it.

    But when you are face-to-face with a child, what do you do? The child is utterly helpless. The child is completely without power. If the remnant cannot generate an army in demonstration of its own strength, then what about a child, for heaven’s sakes?

    The lessons are keeping up, they’re being piled up for Judah’s consideration, and beyond Judah, they’re being piled up for your consideration. Theologically, it is not going to be sufficient for us just to take stock of these things that are laid out for us here, for we are going to have to consider them in light of the program and the scheme of God’s redemptive purposes. For where does Isaiah live? Where does Ahaz live? Where does this church of the Old Testament at this time live? Where does it exist?

    It exists between the time of the ascent of David to the throne. It lives in the time between the ascent of David to his throne to that time of the promise of the return of David, even in his greater self. And redemptively and historically, you see the correlation between Ahaz’s situation, Isaiah’s situation, the church of the Old Testament. and your own. Where do you live? You live between the time of the ascent of David’s greater son and his returning glory.

    And that’s what makes this word meaningful. It means for you that this word carries with it its own application, and it is imperative that you identify with it and live under what it says. That church in Isaiah’s day being called by these various means to consider her circumstance and situation, particularly in light of God’s greatness and her own weakness, and you likewise, my friends. Just what power Will you present from yourself before the God who sits upon the circumference of the earth and looks upon us as if we were so many grasshoppers? I didn’t make that language up.

    It comes from Isaiah chapter 4. So then you have a series of children, one after another, striking, striking at you, striking at your pride, just as they struck at the pride of the Judeans in the days of Ahaz. Isaiah 7-12, those chapters, have been called the Book of Emmanuel, a description which this section of scripture picks up from the second child in the series to be mentioned. This second child introduced to you in verses 10 and following of the seventh chapter is dramatically described as that one who is virgin conceived, verse 14.

    Now we’re really talking about powerlessness, aren’t we? The name of this child, Immanuel, as you know, means God with us. It is repeated in chapter 8, verse 8, alluded to, laid within the lines of chapter 8, verse And it is thought that the nature of the person in view and the reign in view progressively builds throughout these chapters to an appropriate conclusion. From the immediate threat introduced at the beginning of chapter 7, these Immanuel chapters extend to coming events in Judah’s history and envision even a worldwide dispersion of God’s people, chapter 11. But going even further, These Immanuel chapters touch the last days in God’s saving purpose for the whole earth, chapter 12. It’s as if the book of Immanuel were a book unto itself, complete unto itself. And in it you have, as it were, the history of the entire world set in front of you.

    That is, from God’s perspective. The child becomes the appropriate figure, then, in God’s saving activity, because, as it should be obvious to you, the child so eloquently communicates, first of all, weakness, helplessness, not strength and power. The child is the appropriate vehicle in whom and through whom God is able to speak about the absoluteness of his power in accomplishing his purpose in contrast to human inadequacy. Emmanuel is the second child.

    Actually, there are five distinct references to children in the course of these chapters, seven through twelve. not that they are all separate and distinct children. The first three appear to be children born either to Isaiah or at least contemporary to him, and that’s the immediate meaning even of Immanuel. These three children are Shir Yishuv, chapter 7, verse 3, a man who we already identified, 714, and then the one whose name is a mouthful, chapter 8, verse 3, maker shallow hasbaz. You will want to be here for the message on him. The last two children identified are first the glory child of chapter 9, verses 6 and 7, the one that is spoken to us along the lines of that famous line, For unto us a child is born. And then finally, the poetically described child of chapter 11, verse 1, the rod from Jesse’s stem, the branch from Jesse’s root, these last two children undoubtedly the same child, the future messianic child. Nevertheless, even the earlier mentioned children are prophetic, and they relate to the future. As such, Their meaning is tied to God’s activity, as that activity will manifest itself in the course of successive events over which God is absolutely sovereign. This is the case with Shir Yeshua, the first of the children, chapter 7, verse 3. Shir Y’shuv is Isaiah’s own child, born to him.

    His name means, a remnant shall return. The Lord tells Isaiah to take this child with him when he goes out to meet Ahaz. We’ve read the text, we won’t read it again. Obviously, I’m sure you’ve picked up on this, the child in his name is meant to communicate something to Ahaz. It won’t be just the words that Isaiah speaks, it will be the child himself. But what exactly is this child meant to communicate? From what follows, the precise nature of that communication is not altogether clear. In fact, it seems as if the child in his name is something of anachronism, out of place, out of joint, historically.

    For Isaiah is to tell Ahaz that Syria and Ephraim will certainly be extinguished. They are smoldering stubs of a fire burning. The plans of Pica and Reason will not come to pass. Ahaz is not to fear. But this sounds as if Judah, then, is going to be spared. There will be no defeat, there will be no subsequent exile or displacement for the people as a consequence of the defeat, and thus there will be no need for a message concerning a returning remnant. So if Isaiah is calling Ahaz to faith in this passage, what role does shir jeshuv play in accompanying his father on this mission? If the child’s name means a remnant shall return, from the message that Isaiah is verbally communicating to the king, it would seem that the child, in his name and in his presence, is nothing less than superfluous.

    Again, anachronism. Out of joint, out of sync, historically. But before you leap too quickly to that conclusion, The truth of the matter is that Shir Yishud, in his name, is altogether relevant. You see, that boy, that child, carries a name that preaches territorial loss. The boy carries The child carries a name that assumes territorial loss, even the loss of Judas’ grip upon the land of promise. The child in his name preaches loss and sacrifice. What the Lord intends to set before Ahaz in this child, and we assume the child says nothing, what the Lord intends to set before Ahaz in this child is the dynamic of that faith to which the king himself is called. What is operative in that faith?

    While faith is not merely asked to rest in the promise of a present deliverance, that tomorrow everything is going to be all right, even though today you are quaking in your boots. No, that faith is constrained to look even further. In fact, Ahaz has to look past Isaiah to the child, and in looking further, in looking past Isaiah to the child, he is consented with a walking message that speaks eloquently, that message touching the future. the future of Judah herself, preaching a message to Ahaz that he is being compelled to consider that despite present deliverance, deliverance will not always be there. In fact, you are going to have to face loss, and in the midst of loss, it is in that kind that the dynamic of that true faith that I expect from my people will be tested and be confirmed. Tomorrow, the Syrians and the Ephraimites will disappear, but there is coming a day in Judah will be faced with loss, the dimension of that loss so great that it would seem that restoration is utterly impossible. And what of your faith then? A remnant shall return.

    Here is the man who is involved in intrigues, who is plotting and scheming all of the time, insuring himself against the bets of the nations, conspiring with Assyria in order to secure himself, and he is being faced now in the figure of a child with the ultimate issue of loss. And it is only in that context that faith in its ultimate reach proves itself, and it is the same, you see, for you. Trouble with the job? It resolves itself, doesn’t it? Temporary illness, you get through it, don’t you? Crisis in the Church, we ultimately move past it, don’t we? But it’s that thing that is tested by the loss of everything that proves itself. What if you die? Will you live?

    That’s the message. And I think you understand how it is vitally and dynamically connected to the gospel. You do understand, don’t you? For your faith, by root of the gospel, touches ultimate things. And it is your confidence, due to that faith, that despite death, you will live. Now that’s a Christmas message. Those are the kinds of Christmas messages we need, not mine, and I hope you delight in it. Let’s pray.

    We thank you for your servant, O God, Isaiah, raised up by you so powerfully and effectively used. And Lord, in looking to him, we would be moved to plead on behalf of his race, on behalf of the Jews themselves. But many, in considering him even today, would be moved by his message. and now, because of your Spirit, comprehend. We ask for ourselves also, that we would not lose heart. And Father, may it be that our faith is not just a remedial faith, one that is convenient, the present at hand for the troubling little and trivial disturbances in our lives, that actually reaches out and touches the end of the world. O Lord, help us to see all of our present difficulties in light of the vast and magnificent plan of salvation which you oversee. And may we know, O God, that even if we suffer loss, we shall gain. And even if we die, because of Jesus Christ, we shall live. Grant us strength for Jesus’ sake.

    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.

  • Those Who Pray Die Well

    Those Who Pray Die Well

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Considering the Church” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, October 16, 1994.

    About this sermon

    1 Timothy 2 grounds the church’s prayer in God’s purpose to gather worshipers from every nation, beyond personal devotional habit. Paul draws on Old Testament precedent for that call. Those who pray die well and lead well.

    More sermons from Isaiah · Browse all sermons

    Sermon transcript

    We begin our reading this morning in the prophecy of Isaiah. I think everyone has figured out now that they shouldn’t trust what I put in the bulletin. We are in Isaiah chapter 56, and I am reading here verses 6 through 8. This is Isaiah 56, verses 6-8, and I am reading from the New American Standard Version. Give your attention to the Word of God.

    Also, the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord, to minister to Him and to love the name of the Lord, to be his servants, everyone who keeps from profaning the Sabbath and holds fast my covenant. Even those I will bring to my holy mountain and make them joyful in my house of prayer. Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be acceptable on my altar, for my house will be called a house of prayer for all nations.” The Lord God who gathers the dispersed of Israel declares, yet others I will gather to them, to those already gathered. And then turning over to the prophecy of Malachi, this is Malachi chapter one, and I am reading from verse six.

    Malachi 1.6. A son honors his father and a servant his master. Then if I am a father, where is my honor? If I am a master, where is my respect? Says the Lord of hosts to you, O priests who despise my name. But you say, how have we despised thy name? You are presenting defiled food upon my altar. But you say, how have we defiled thee? in that you say the table of the Lord is to be despised. But when you present the blind for sacrifice, is it not evil? When you present the lame and sick, is it not evil? Why not offer it to your governor?

    Would he be pleased with you, or would he receive you kindly, says the Lord of Hosts? But now will you not entreat God’s favor that he may be gracious to you with such an offering on your part Will he receive any of you kindly, says the Lord of Hosts, or that there were one among you who would shut the gates that you might not uselessly kindle fire on my altar? I am not pleased with you, says the Lord of Hosts, nor will I accept an offering from you. For from the rising of the sun, even to its setting, my name will be great among the nations, and in every place incense is going to be offered to my name, and a grain offering that is pure, for my name will be great among the nations,” says the Lord of Hosts.

    First of all, then, I urge that in treaties and prayers, petitions and thanksgivings be made on behalf of all men, for kings and all who are in authority, in order that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity. This is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior. who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. There is one God and one mediator also between God and man, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all, the testimony born at the proper time. And for this I was appointed a preacher and an apostle, I am telling the truth, I am not lying, as a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth. Therefore, I want men in every place to pray, lifting up holy hands without wrath and dissension.

    Our Father, we do ask you to help us in every bit of our worship. Yes, Lord, there is that which we seek for ourselves, that we might be fed and nourished. But there is also that which we seek for others, that they might be fed and nourished too. Therefore, O God, May we be concerned about our deportment in worship, our conduct in the assembly of your people. And help us, O Father, lest we become a source of stumbling for others. Help us, O God, so that our concentration might be an encouragement to others in their concentration. May we attend then upon your word as we have heard it this morning and as it is preached. We pray this for Jesus Christ himself by the Spirit is with us. Encourage us through him. Amen.

    Now it is my intention to work towards the title that appears in the bulletin this morning, specifically, Who Shall Teach? And I think that there will be enough evidences of that as we move our way through our message this morning, although in certain respects this sermon in strict terms of that title will prove to be a disappointment. So you can be assured that more will follow. My intention this morning is to do a bit of back-filling, a bit of back-tracking.

    We have been considering 1 Timothy, chapter 3. That’s why I say back-filling and back-tracking. We have been considering 1 Timothy, chapter 3, verses 14 through 16, and that in connection with our series on the Church, the subject of the Church. And our interest, specifically now, with regard to these latter verses in 1 Timothy 3, has been to set out Paul’s purpose in writing this, his first letter, to Timothy, his beloved son in the faith. Now, once more, and briefly, I will review what we have seen from those latter verses 1 Timothy 3.

    Since Paul will be delayed in coming to Timothy at Ephesus, verse 14, he now writes to this young pastor so that he might know, so he says, how to conduct himself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, truth’s pillar and memorial, verse 15. Verse 16 serves as a reminder to Timothy of a common point of view. By common confession, Paul says, great is the mystery of godliness. So, verse 16 here is set as a reminder to Timothy of a common point of view to be held by the Church leadership, to be sure, but that in concert with all. in the Church of Jesus Christ, and that in the strictest and in the deepest humility.”

    Now, it is this dual consideration that is going to play itself out throughout the entirety of this first letter to Timothy. The dual consideration of a focus towards leadership on the one hand, and then to the congregation as a whole on the other. And these two considerations will intermingle throughout Paul’s writing.

    So much do they intermingle, you might note, that when Paul comes to the end of 1 Timothy, he has a final statement to make, a benediction that is couched in the plural, not in the singular. He says, Grace be with you. And the U there is a plural pronoun, it is not a singular pronoun, so you can see that Paul all along, though addressing Timothy and not quite directly, has the Church as a whole very much in view.

    But backing up now into chapter two. We are enabled here, if we look at things correctly, to see that the Apostle is actually prosecuting his case for the conclusions that he is going to arrive at in that pivotal and encapsulating statement at the end of chapter 3. He is building to that point. In other words, what Paul says in 1 Timothy 3, 14 through 16, and most particularly in that 15th verse, about conduct in the house of God is directly related to the matters that he is discussing in chapter 2. And interestingly now, in making his comments here in chapter 2, in building towards the expression of this Capsule statement in chapter 3, verse 15, about conduct in the house of God, Paul, now here in chapter 2 at its beginning, turns first of all to the subject of prayer.

    Now, you might note the emphasis. For as you run down through the verses there, it is obvious, is it not, that first of all, the consideration is prayer in the widest and most common expression. That is to say, Paul here speaks about prayer as a primary activity of not just a few or even of the ordained, but of all, even though he’s going to come back to that subject of leadership. and he will even subordinate what he has to say here to that issue of leadership before he is done.

    The sound that is to come from God’s people In the language of 1 Timothy 3.15, the conduct of the first order by which they are to be known is prayer. The sound that is to come from the people of God, the conduct of the first order by which they are to be known, is not to be the hubbub of an infinite number of social enterprises and activities It is not to be the hubbub of bazaars, or rummage sales, or other social events held in the basement of a church.

    Nor is it to be the cries and the screams of elation that come from people engaged in recreation. Least of all, bingo games. It is not to be the rumble of the multi-level mass program for the youth, for the middle-aged, and even for the moderately senile. It is not even in the first place to be the clanging of silverware, the clinking of china and glassware at the church supper, as important and as enjoyable as that supper might be. Now, the sound that is to come from the people of God, the conduct of the first order by which they are to be marked, is prayer.

    But in looking at Paul’s appeals for prayer in 1 Timothy 2, verses 1 through 8, we must not allow ourselves to slip off into a world of silly mindlessness that has become the habit of too many in expressing what they consider to be Christian piety in our times.

    The Apostle has grounded his exhortations. He has based his urgings in the purposes of God and in God’s accomplishment in establishing for himself a new house, a new temple, his church, truth, pillar, and memorial through the work and person of Jesus Christ. In other words, Paul’s appeal now here for prayer is quintessentially redemptive, historical, doctrinal, and theological in the highest order. We are dealing with substantive matters. not mindless sentiment. Now, in order to understand exactly how the Apostle Paul works off of this redemptive historical background and pushes forward his doctrinal and theological interest, we need to look at these verses First of all, grouping 1 through 7, and then verse 8 by itself. You will note how Paul, in dealing with verses 1 through 7, sets before us the universal scope of God’s redemptive purpose.

    And he’s not here apologizing for his language. Yes, I believe that Paul is thoroughly Augustinian and Calvinistic. But he is not apologizing for his language at this point, and you will note the universal scope of that language and interest of the Apostle.

    All the nations are being gathered into God’s new house, into his new temple. Think of it. The privilege of a few has now become the privilege of the many. And it is a privilege into which you have been introduced by grace. All the nations are being gathered now into God’s new house, into His new temple. The prophets themselves saw this day coming. a time when the nations would stream up into the house of the Lord.

    That’s why I read for you this morning Isaiah chapter 56, verses 6 through 8. You may want to look at those verses again. In verse 6, aliens and strangers—Gentiles—unite themselves to the Lord. These who are unclean and outsiders are described as if they are ministers themselves to the Lord in His sanctuary. They keep the Sabbath, and they celebrate the sacraments.

    In verse 7 of Isaiah 56, God says that He will bring them, that is, the nations, to His holy mountain, to joyous celebration in His house of prayer. and to a position in which they will offer acceptable sacrifices to him. For my house, says the Lord, will be called a house of prayer for all nations.”

    Now that text may well sound very familiar to you, because you are acquainted with the story of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem and his cleansing of the temple. You might check out in this respect Mark 11, verse 17, where Jesus quotes this Isaian text to indicate that the day envisioned by the prophet has dawned in him and in his wife. Paul’s appeal then for prayer is based upon His knowledge of the fulfillment of this Isaian text. Prayers with thanksgiving must be made for all men now, for rulers and for governments, given God’s universal intention and His desire to save all sorts of people through the mediation of the one man Christ Jesus, the man who paid himself a ransom, yes, for his own, but his own being drawn now from all of the tribes of the earth.”

    But with Isaiah 56, together with Jesus’ closure of that text, in his cleansing of the temple, lying behind Paul’s appeal now for prayer, as he speaks to Timothy here, the opening of his second chapter in the first letter to his beloved son in the faith, Paul then goes on to deepen his appeal by what he has to say in verse 8. It is here that Paul alludes to the second passage that we read this morning. It is here that he alludes to Malachi chapter 1, verse 11. The Lord, in this Malachi text, has been making his case against his people Israel, who have doubted his love, but specifically, at the point in which we began to read, those priests who defile his altar with mutilated, inferior, and deformed offerings, verses 6-9.

    Therefore, the Lord no longer accepts their offerings, and in a truly ominous text, and that’s why I read to you this morning from the New American Standard Version, In a truly ominous text, the Lord Himself anticipates and even longs for the closing of the temple gates in Jerusalem. Verse 10. Can you imagine the closing of those gates? The Lord Himself wishing for nothing less than that. But then the Lord proceeds, through his prophet, in a verse as glorious as the previous one was ominous, to declare that his name will be great among the nations. From morning to evening, in every place, prayers will be offered in his name.

    Verse 11. It is that phrase, in every place, that finds perfect match in 1 Timothy 2 verse 8. Paul is lifting it right out of that Malachi text. Notice now how Paul’s use of the Malachi allusion in verse 8 complements his use of Isaiah 56 in verses 1 through 7 in 1 Timothy 2.

    Isaiah, you will recall, sees all the nations gathering into one place. unto the Lord’s holy house of prayer. Malachi, on the other hand, sees the nations in every place offering acceptable praise and prayer. The beauty and the power of Paul’s appeal in 1 Timothy 2 is that both Isaiah and Malachi in his writing then converge.

    In the New House, in the New Testament, The church, the one through God, dwells with his people whom he gathers for prayer from over the face of the entire world by the mediation of the final priest, Christ Jesus. But while gathered, these who are gathered remain those who in every place offer service in prayer.” Verse 8, “…in one place, yet in every place, through the one man for all men.”

    And we all are the privileged. to live in the reality of what the prophets foresaw. This, then, motivates the Apostle all the more to write as he does, calling the Church to prayer. We have been welcomed into God’s new house in prayer. We offer acceptable sacrifices. Indeed, when it comes to our conduct in the house of God, Of great importance is prayer, since in this day of the gospel the Lord has opened access for all the nations to enter into the one place from every place.” Now, there are many things that I could say to you about this matter of prayer and its importance to the people of God. But I will draw from my experience of twenty-two years in the ministry to set before you this consideration.

    Those who pray well die well. Those who pray well die well. I have watched many people age in my 22 years of service, and I have watched a number of even professing Christians go into old age filled with bitterness. And I dare say that those are precisely the people who have never learned the lessons of First Timothy two. As we get older, there may be questions about how we fill up our day, what we do with our But the person who has given himself or herself to prayer has no question about what they should be about.

    I can encourage you then, on this very practical note, as you move on in life, as your own end draws nearer, that you give yourself to prayer. But still, as I promised earlier in the message, there is a further consideration. It is true that Paul speaks here in these verses about a universal privilege and duty that falls to God’s people as a whole. However, there is a specific interest of this epistle as it concerns the matter of leadership. And even here, as he speaks about prayer, that matter of leadership is coming into play. He is writing to Timothy. even though others are addressed through Timothy by the letter itself.

    Timothy is a leader in the church at Ephesus presently. Also, as is obvious from what appears here in this letter, Timothy is facing the threat of both women and men who wish to lead, but for various reasons cannot and even must not. Also, there are obvious defections from among the leaders. If you look at the end of chapter one, you can see the names of a couple of defectors. Paul’s ministry, his leadership itself, is under attack.

    And before he is done, he will speak specifically, directly, about the matter of bishops and deacons in chapter three. So, leadership, yes. is very much to the point, and serves to narrow our concern. You understand, then, what the Apostle is doing as he rushes to the common activity of prayer, but has in the back of his mind how this is going to play itself out in terms of leadership. By taking prayer and even the common practice of it, Paul has set before leaders—he has set before Timothy, he has set before supposed leaders, he has set before leaders who want to be leaders—the most fundamental of criteria. Leaders must rise out of the wild world of common prayer. Leaders must rise out of the wide world of common prayer.

    Leaders must be men humbled and proved in their sincerity, because they have given themselves to this fundamental, vital, and glorious enterprise. And if they don’t understand that, they don’t understand anything. To put it very bluntly, if you’re not given the prayer, you aren’t fit to lead. Amen. Let’s pray.

    How we love you, O God. And how our love is trained increasingly by the depths that we discover in your word. That we have been welcomed now into the new house of the Lord, into your temple, the new temple. and made to behold wonder, and even through faith, your glorious presence. How our consciences have been quieted through the blood of Christ, our medium. But how now, Lord, we are congregated, and as the incense rose morning and evening from the altar in the temple. So our prayers rise presently. And this, Lord, in order that our communion with you may be enjoyed all the more and the covenantal bond that is between us, realized in us all the more.

    Help us, Lord, we who are not leaders in the Church, to give ourselves to prayer, that all of us, Lord, who would lead May we rise from this common expression and experience of prayer. Thus, Lord, may we be commended by you in the presence of all because we are men of prayer. Help us, Lord, and bless your church with congregations that are filled with prayer and leaders who love to pray.

    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.

  • Heaven Is My Throne

    Heaven Is My Throne

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “New Heavens & New Earth” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, January 14, 1990.

    About this sermon

    Isaiah sees near and far events at once, the return from exile and the end of all things in the same frame. God declares that no house built by hands can hold him. When God brings in the new forms, his people must leave the old ones behind.

    More sermons from Isaiah · Browse all sermons

    Sermon transcript

    Our scripture reading tonight is Isaiah chapter 66. And God says to the Lord, Heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool. Where, then, is a house you could build for me? And where is a place that I may rest? For my hand made all these things, thus all these things came into being, declares the Lord. But to this one I will look, to him who is humble and contrite of spirit and who trembles at my word.

    But he who kills an ox He’s like one who slays a man. He who sacrifices a lamb is like the one who breaks a dog’s neck. He who offers a grain offering is like one who offers swine’s blood. He who burns incense is like the one who blesses an idol. As they have chosen their own ways and their soul delights in their abominations, so I will choose their punishments, and I will bring on them what they dread.

    Because I called that no one answered, I spoke that they did not listen. And they did evil in my sight and chose that in which I did not delight. Hear the word of the Lord, you who tremble at his word. Your brothers who hate you, who exclude you for my name’s sake, have said, let the Lord be glorified, that we may see your joy. That they will be put to shame. A voice of uproar from the city, a voice from the temple, the voice of the Lord who is rendering recompense to his enemies. Before she prevailed, she brought forth Before her pain came, she gave birth to a boy. Who has heard such a thing? Who has seen such things? Shall a land be born in one day? Can a nation be brought forth all at once? As soon as Zion prevailed, she also brought forth her sons.

    Shall I bring to the point of birth and not give delivery, says the Lord? or shall I, who gives delivery shut the womb, says your God, be joyful with Jerusalem and rejoice for her, all you who love her. Be exceedingly glad with her, all you who mourn over her, that you may nourish and be satisfied with her comforting breasts, that you may suck and be delighted with her bountiful bosom. For thus says the Lord, Behold, I extend peace to her like a river, and the glory of the nations like an overflowing stream. You shall be nourished, you shall be carried on the hip and fondled on the knees. As one whom his mother comforts, so I will comfort you. You shall be comforted in Jerusalem. Then you shall see this, and your heart shall be glad, and your bones shall flourish like the new grass.

    And the hand of the Lord shall be made known to his servants, and he shall be indignant toward his enemies. For behold, the Lord will come in fire, and his chariots like the whirlwind to render his anger with fury and his rebuke with flames of fire. The Lord will execute judgment in fire and by his sword on all flesh, and those slain by the Lord will be many. Those who sanctify and purify themselves to go to the gardens following one who is centered, who eats the swine’s flesh, the testable things, and mice, shall come to an end altogether, declares the Lord.

    For I know their works and their thoughts. The time is coming to gather all nations and tongues, and they shall come and see my glory. I will set a sign among them, and I will send survivors from them to the nations, Tarshish, Hood, Lod, Nashik, Rosh, Tubal, and Javan, to the distant coastlands that have neither heard my fame nor seen my glory. They will declare my glory among the nations.

    Then they shall bring all your brethren from all the nations as a grain offering to the Lord on horses and chariots, in litters, on mules, and on camels, to my holy mountain Jerusalem, says the Lord, just as the sons of Israel bring their grain offerings in a clean vessel to the house of the Lord. I will also take some of them for priests and for Levites, says the Lord. Just as the new heavens and the new earth which I make will endure before me, declares the Lord, so your offspring and your name will endure. And it shall be from new moon to new moon and from sabbath to sabbath, all mankind will come to bow down before me, says the Lord. Then they shall go forth and look on the corpses of the men who have transgressed against me. For their worm shall not die, and their fire shall not be quenched. And they shall be an abhorrence to all mankind.”

    Our Father, truly our comforts are found with you and our peace is found in your word. We ask, Lord, that more and more we might understand how it is that we live in that which the word describes and declares. Father, take away from us that thought that we live at a distance from what your word says may that distance then be removed for us that we may not think that your word came to people in a different time that we live in our own unique time rather Lord we pray that you may sense our participation in the things we hear you say to these people and through your servant, Isaiah. Bless us, our God, now in our time together. May we love you as we revere your word. Amen.

    We have been considering the theme of the new heavens and the new earth And we have come to Isaiah because, in one respect, Isaiah is known as the prophet of the New Heavens and the New Earth. We have him mentioning the New Heavens and the New Earth twice. Once in verse 17, verse 65, and then again in the passage that we read tonight, verse 22 of chapter 66. Isaiah. the prophet of the new heavens and the new earth. But this mention of the new heavens and the new earth occurs in a very powerful, very compelling portion of Isaiah’s prophecy.

    It does in fact occur at the conclusion of his prophecy, the fact that I’m sure we’ve not missed it by you, thus accenting the significance of this declaration by Isaiah. Context, of course, broadly speaking, we have reviewed on a number of occasions. The context historically, of course, is the assault of the Assyrians on Judah, Jerusalem, threat to the southern tribes. They will in fact follow along the path in the course and be overtaken by the fate and the judgment that had overtaken the ten northern tribes.

    Isaiah prophesying in this day, looking down the border of time, seeing all future events somewhat compressed and superimposed on one another. Almost as if you cannot distinguish near events from distant events. Near events that are relatively proximate, namely the coming deportation of Judah, the citizens of Jerusalem, under the Babylonians, the coming destruction of the city of Jerusalem and the Temple. as if he could not distinguish that somewhat proximate event from the distant event of the end of the world, or the coming of Christ, or the rise of the Church, or the blessing of the Spirit. That’s the nature of the Prophet’s vision. He sees distant events and proximate events together. He reads them together, as if they are all happening simultaneously.

    Now we have said that because of that prophetic vision, the Church has become very confused. The church has difficulty understanding what’s proximate and what’s distant. Is it able to sort it out well? Gets into all kinds of arguments about what is proximate, what is distant. Becomes confused and upset about the meaning of particular phrases, ideas, intentions from the prophet.

    Beyond this matter of how far distant an event may be, is, what does a specific event mean? When the prophet talks about the revitalization of Jerusalem, the city, is he merely talking about Jews coming back from Babylon, or is he seeing something greater still? Is he seeing the establishment of the final city of God, the Zion that is above, the heavenly city? But speaking of that cities in turn that are readily understandable to his audience would be to the U.S. So there are those complications and difficulties, and they have caused a great deal of discussion and even argument in the Church of Christ down through the ages.

    The context, broadly speaking, we have given to you. Circumstances in the 8th century, 700 years before the birth of Christ. As Isaiah now looks down the corridor of time, he sees the coming exile, deportation of the people of Jerusalem under the Babylonians. also their eventual return, but not only that, but dawn of a new day in which God’s servant shall stand forth to be the propitiation for his people’s sins, and also bring blessing in keeping with the promise made of him centuries before for all the nations. OK.

    And even though Isaiah has to this advantage, being a prophet, being visited with visions of God, being in direct communication with God. Yet, he stands as one who yet yearns for God’s final salvation, God’s deliverance of his people. We hear Isaiah’s prayer. After all that has been said throughout the prophecy in its entirety, after Isaiah has been privileged to know these things, give expression to the glorious hope, certain judgment, the glorious hope, he is still a man filled with turmoil and distress.

    The man who is filled with anguish, consternation, respect to the circumstance of the people of God, the church of his day, her suffering, her plight, the disobedience that is evident within her, and God’s action with respect to her. So, Isaiah 63. If you look at that, Isaiah 63, verse 7. And then you move from that 7th verse of Isaiah 63 to the conclusion of Isaiah 64. There is this concluding prayer from Isaiah.

    He is crying out to God, knowing all that he does. He is still filled with trouble. He is still filled with distress and concern. He turns to God now. At the conclusion of this prophecy, pleading with him. And he is pleading with him because he knows for sure the impending judgment. He knows for sure the impending judgment. Even though he has been given promises with respect to what lies beyond that judgment, he is concerned, he is racked, He is in deep pain because of what is coming.

    There is the judgment that is coming upon the city, and there is the devastation that is coming upon the temple. Think of what this means to a Jew. Be ye as informed as Isaiah. be he as enlightened as this prophet, the city is going to be destroyed, the temple is going to be razed, there’s not going to be one stone left upon another, the entirety of it undone. He cries out in verse 15 of chapter 63, look down from heaven, O God, and see from my holy and glorious habitation, where are thy zeal and thy mighty deeds, theatics?

    The stirring of thy heart and thy compassion are restrained toward me.” The grief to be experienced by the people is something that he anticipates, and even now expresses. And what of the marvelous entreaty to the Lord at the beginning of chapter 64, one that I’m sure you’ve heard time and time again, O that thou wouldst rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains might quake at thy presence, that you might act again to save your people, to deliver them He asks, at the conclusion of his prayer, verse 12 of chapter 64, “‘Wilt thou restrain thyself at these things, O Lord? Wilt thou keep silent and afflict us beyond measure?’ It is specifically his zeal for Judah, for the city of Jerusalem, and especially her temple, that drives him in his prayer. Listen to his description in verses 10 and 11 in chapter 64.

    My holy cities have become a wilderness. Here he is looking down to that time which the devastation will come. My holy cities have become a wilderness. Zion has become a wilderness. Jerusalem a desolation. Our holy and beautiful house that is the temple where our fathers praised thee. have been burned with fire, and all our precious things have become a ruin.”

    Well, that… that is, then, the condition of Isaiah’s heart. He comes to the end of life. You might think that Isaiah would say, well, those who are punished and judged, they have it coming. And if God judges his house, his household, then his household is quite deserving. But even though Israel is deserving of that judgment, Isaiah’s heart is still moved. How is it possible for a preacher, how is it possible for a preacher to plead with you with regard to a certain coming judgment and then love? The problem for Isaiah is the problem of those who truly follow in his steps.

    You see the destruction that is human. You see the waywardness of the people, the stubbornness of hearts. You see wickedness, unrepentant, zeal, not encouraged, nor pursued. And your heart is broken. And yet the fact that devastation is coming and certainly shall visit even the Church of Jesus Christ causes you to cry out for the Bride of Christ, for the habitation of the Spirit. God now answers. He responds to Isaiah’s prayer.

    Chapters 65 and 66. And at the center of this answer which God gives is the promise of the new heavens and the new earth. Verses which That phrase, it appears, has already been sung. And at the center of this new heavens and new earth will be a new Jerusalem. Note verse 17 of chapter 65. There the mention of the new heavens and the new earth. God is going to create afresh. Former things shall not be remembered or come to mind.

    But be glad and rejoice forever in what I create, for behold, I create Jerusalem for rejoicing, and her people for gladness.” At the center of the new heavens and the new earth will be the new city, the new city of God, the new Jerusalem. And we’ve spoken about the qualities of this new city and the quality of life in it. Note the description that follows in verses 18 through 25.

    There will be perpetual joy and gladness, joy and gladness that cannot be interrupted. There will be no more sorrow, we are told. The voice of weeping, the sound of crying, will not be heard in the New Jerusalem. The whole issue of age, how old you are, will be immaterial. For sorrow and crying, weeping, having been banished, death itself will have been banished.

    Life forever in the new city, in the new heavens and the new earth. In the city, possessions will be permanent. That is, you will not be able to lose anything. You will never suffer loss. Building a house, you’ll inhabit it. Planning a vineyard, you’ll be the fruit, you’ll harvest the grain. The work of your hands established, that is, there will be no futility, no emptiness, no dissatisfaction.

    And as this beautiful section of the prophecy concludes, you hear that what is truly transpiring as God gives the new earth, gives the new heavens, grants the new city, there is nothing less than an undoing of the curse. Why? The wolf and the lamb will graze together. The lion will eat straw like the ox. Satan himself will be merrily judged. There shall be no harm or evil in all my holy knowledge. Utter perfection. A wonder. What a glory. Here is God’s answer.

    But this answer is not without its problem, as chapter 66 goes on to tell us. For you see, when God acts anew to establish His new heavens and new earth, and when He establishes His new city, Jerusalem, This new environment will bring into operation an entirely new administration. What if, in answer to the prayer uttered by Isaiah in chapter 64, verse 1, O that thou which trend the heavens and come down, God did in fact come down? What then of the temple? What then of the temple? You see, Isaiah is concerned about this temple. But if God does actually come down, And in His descent brings the transformation of all reality.

    New heavens, new earth, new cities. Let me tell you. In what He brings, there will be no need for the devil. A new administration. Heaven is my throne, earth is my footstool. Where then is a house you could build for me? And a place, where is a place that I may rest? For whatever dwelling would be established would be utterly inadequate. Which means, of course, that there was an inadequacy to the prior administration.

    Even that temple upon which Isaiah has focused all of his attention and concern. that temple, I might say, in which he saw the original vision by which he was called in Isaiah 6. The inadequacy of that temple is accented now by the mystery of the true temple, the nature of which is revealed. For when God comes down, he does not dwell in a building. But to this one I will look, to him who is humble, contrite in spirit, and who trembles at my word. the inadequacy of the prior testament, the mystery of the new administration, the nature of the true testament, where God dwells, a humble heart, contrite spirit. Not only this, as you read on, verses three through six, an earthly temple becomes the scene of that which the Lord abhors. Those who cling to the earthly temple in their service, even if it be unto God, become an importance to him.

    You play it off for a sacrifice like murdering a man and as it is abominable to murder someone so in God’s eyes it will be an abomination to even play it off formally it was what the Lord required what he commanded now. It’s completely unacceptable more than that. It’s the most serious form of sin. When God comes down and temples with his people, to continue to go through the temple, and to perform sacrifice there, is an abomination to him.

    Once it was right to sacrifice a lamb, but now the Lamb of God has been slain. And anyone who then slays a lamb as a sacrifice will be slaying, as it were, a dog. Great offerings will be like the offering of swine’s blood, burning incense, as if to an idol. the worship of Yahweh becomes worship that is idolatrous. And the day when the new administration comes, God comes down as well with the Holy Communion. God promises then that temple service in that day, if it is pursued, will be a sacrilege.

    And those who practice temple service after God has worked His work will be enemies of God’s true service. So then there comes verse 6. the voice of uproar from the city, the old city, the voice from the temple. Or you might think it is the wailing of those who have been overtaken there in their sacrilege. It is the voice of the Lord, the Word of God, as He renders recompense to His enemies. There are those who hold on to earthly and earthy administrations in a day when the new comes. And though they call themselves friends of God and practitioners of true religion, they are in fact God’s enemies. God is jealous of certain things. You understand why Paul is so exercised when he hears of Galatians going back to the old It’s no incidental matter to him.

    It’s a matter of life and death. You go back to the old form, you’ll die. Don’t you know that? You will die. Why does the writer of the letter to the Hebrews plead, plead so strenuously and earnestly with his audience? If you go back to the shadows and the previous things, you will walk with perseverance. You will fail in your endurance, you will come short of God’s glory, and salvation will be denied you. You can’t hold on to the old when the new comes.

    So it is that God answers. He answers Isaiah’s concern about the city and about the temple by telling him about the passing nature of both. Both are fading. It is specifically this message that is picked up by Stephen his plea with Jerusalem in his day is in fact that the hour has come for the arrival of the new administration and this stiff-necked generation continues to resist God. Stephen quotes from this portion of scripture in Acts 7 verses 49 and 50. But that brings us now to the conclusion of the prophecy. Verses 7 through 24. We cannot read these latter verses of this prophecy without having in view the new heavens, new earth, and that new Jerusalem of which the Lord has spoken.

    In the realization of this new Jerusalem, There will be, as it were, a short-lived labor. Before she prevailed, she brought forth. Before her pain came, she gave birth to a child. Though it seems like an extensive labor, nothing could be more severe, Isaiah himself feeling it severely. God is saying that when all is finished, it will seem but a passing moment. The delivery taking place even prior to the labor pains. God Himself will bring His purpose to birth.

    And when he does, the birth of a child for a family is truly a joyous occasion. But now, an entirely new form, an entirely new world has been born. An entirely new setting, situation, and the joy is unprecedented. There is satisfaction, peace, and comfort. These things are known in their perfection in the New Jerusalem, verses 10 through 13. The Church will delight, the people of God will rejoice, but the enemy’s destruction is certain and swift, verses 14 through 17.

    And in this circumstance, as God is concluding His purposes and intentions, He gathers the nations for the unveiling of His glory, and in the midst of the nation, His sign appears. It sounds as if what is expected here at the end of Isaiah’s prophecy is fulfilled in what we read and act. as there come from the various nations of the earth those representatives of all the tribes for the unveiling of God’s glory and the setting up of His sign in their midst. And then the emissaries are dispersed who tell of His glory among the nations.”

    Verse 19. This leads to true and full worship, the perfect restoration of all of God’s owners. They are gathered unto Him from the four corners of the earth. He’s elect come for that true and perfect worship of God. And in that day there will be a renewed priesthood. A new Levitical order, a ministry for the gospel, and diaconal service for the new house of the Lord.

    And God’s people shall live forever, and his enemies shall be damaged. When we come to the end of Isaiah’s prophecy, we come to the end of the world. Though the language may oftentimes be confusing to us, we might not always get the point. What is envisioned is the final administration of God for His people.

    The passing away of the old, in which sorrow and sighing, death and dying were constant, and a grief where the loss of city and temple were the severest concern now into an environment where sorrow flying, death dying, sinning even are impossible and where God’s people live forever perfectly blessed and in which the Lord and the Lamb are the temple and the people dwell with their God those who are humble and contrite in heart in perfect, unbreakable fellowship

    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.

  • Reading the Prophets Rightly

    Reading the Prophets Rightly

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “New Heavens & New Earth” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, January 7, 1990.

    About this sermon

    Two things make the Old Testament prophets hard for us to read. Premillennial and postmillennial schemes both stumble here, because they fail to see events from God’s side. Isaiah 65:17-25, with the wolf and lamb feeding together, describes the heavenly kingdom itself.

    More sermons from Isaiah · Browse all sermons

    Sermon transcript

    Today we are reading from Isaiah chapter 65. This is the word of God. I permitted myself to be sought by those who did not ask for me. I permitted myself to be found by those who did not seek me. I said, hear my, hear my. To a nation which did not call on my name.

    I have spread out my hands all day long to a rebellious people who walk in a way which is not good, following their own thoughts. A people who continually provoke me to my face, offering sacrifices in gardens, and burning incense on bricks. Who sit among groves, sit among graves, and spend the night in secret places, The weak spine’s flesh and the broth of uncleaned meat is in their pots. Who said? Keep to yourself. Do not come near me, for I am holier than thou. These are smoke in my nostrils, a fire that burns all the day. The cold is written before me. I will not keep silent, but I will repay.

    I will even repay into their bosom, both their own iniquities and the iniquities of their father together, says the Lord, because they have burned incense on the mountains and scorned me on the hills. Therefore I will measure their poor work into their bosom.

    Thus says the Lord. As the new wine is found in the cluster, and one says, do not destroy it, for there is benefit in it, so I will act on behalf of my servants in order not to destroy all of them. I will bring forth osprey from Jacob, and an heir of my mountains from Judah, even my chosen ones shall inherit it, and my servants shall dwell there. And Charon shall be a pasture land for flocks, and the valley of Accord a resting place for birds, for my people who seek me.

    But you who forsake the Lord, who forget my holy mountain, who set a table for fortune, and who fill cups with mixed wine for destiny, I will destine you for the sword, and all of you shall bow down to the slaughter, because I called, and you did not answer. I spoke, and you did not hear. And you did evil in my sight, and chose that in which I did not delight.

    Therefore thus says the Lord God, Behold, my servants shall eat, but you shall be hungry. Behold, my servants shall drink, but you shall be thirsty. Behold, my servants shall rejoice, but you shall be put to shame. Behold, my servants shall shout joyfully with a glad heart, but you shall cry out with a heavy heart, and you shall wail with a broken spirit.

    And you will leave your name for a curse to my chosen one. and the Lord God will slay him. But my servants will be called by another name, because he who is blessed in the earth shall be blessed by the God of truth, and he who swears in the earth shall swear by the God of truth, because the former troubles are forgotten, and because they are hid from my sight.

    For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, And the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind. But be glad and rejoice forever in what I create. For behold, I create Jerusalem for rejoicing and her people for gladness. I will also rejoice in Jerusalem and be glad in my people. And there will no longer be heard in her the voice of weeping and the sound of crying. No longer will there be in it an infant who lives but a few days, or an old man who does not live out his days.

    For the youth will die at the age of one hundred, and the one who does not reach the age of one hundred shall be thought a curse. And they shall build houses and inhabit them, and they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit. They shall not build and another inhabit, they shall not plant and another eat. for as the lifetime of a tree, so shall be the days of my people, and my chosen ones shall wear out the work of their hands. They shall not labor in vain, but bear children for calamity, for they are the offspring of those blessed by the Lord, and their descendants with them. It will also come to pass that before they call, I will answer, and while they are still speaking, I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall graze together, and the lion shall eat straw like the ox, and dust shall be the serpent’s food.

    There shall be no evil or harm in all my holy mountain,” says the Lord. we ask you our father that the hymns and psalms that we sing would seal the certainties of our heart that we are devoted to you we ask that the prayers that we offer would in fact be prayers that arise from our souls that we would be intent upon hearing your word that we would give ourselves before you for the sake of service in your name and lord we ask that your word be lodged well within us that we hearing it would keep it before us and that it lord would then be and that ends it that standard that banner that goes before us, that declares for all, that we in fact follow the way that our God has outlined for us by His Word. All of this reflecting, of course, the perfections of your Son, our Savior, for indeed we follow His training. Praise be to your name, our God. Amen. Our journey in considering the New Heavens and the New Earth has taken us from passages that consider indirectly that subject, now to those passages that take up the subject directly and properly. We have looked at the end of Hebrews, the suggestion there in the 12th chapter, of the coming shaking of all things the consequence of that shaking being the abiding character of a kingdom granted to us which cannot be shaken this is our inheritance this is the gift of grace through God and His work. This is God’s gift to us through Jesus Christ.

    We have also looked at 1 Corinthians 5.17.

    In that passage, the Apostle Paul has told us that the very patterns of the new creation are already asserting themselves for us. The very patterns of that new creation are asserting themselves for us. If any man be in Christ, he is new creation. Old things are passed away, old, all things are become new. We, by the reconciling work of God, have been made participants in the new creation order. We are a part of the new creation.

    And we know that the new creation, unlike the prior creation, the former creation, the new creation will not pass away. The new creation is eternal. This creation will pass. But the new creation will not. And you, who believe in Jesus Christ, you who have been reconciled, are a part then of that new creation, that new creation for you. As it endures, so do you. Jesus himself, in the 19th chapter of Matthew, speaks about the regeneration of all things.

    He makes mention to his disciples. He makes mention of it to those whose vision is very short, very limited, quite provincial, very narrow, improperly so. The scope of their vision extends nearly to events close at hand. The expectation that they have, that in fact, when they reach Jerusalem, Jesus is going to take up his reign, an earthly kingdom will be established, and they will be given primary positions of authority within that. Jesus speaks of a new order, an order in which that whole Jerusalem, with its administration, will pass. A new order coming about in which, through regeneration, there will not be any diminishment whatsoever. The glory of this kingdom, which Jesus Christ is in fact establishing, do not grow dim one with.

    What is spoken of us, what is spoken to us concerning the new creation, the new heavens and the new earth, what is intimated on earth, what is spoken of, spoken about so far, also has a foundation in the angels. And we have turned specifically to the prophet Isaiah. And this is what we have said about the prophet Isaiah. Isaiah is a prophet of the vision of God’s fullness. We all remember his call. Isaiah 6, an incredible account given us concerning Isaiah’s confrontation with God in the temple, and how there goes forth from God’s messengers in that scene the acclamation of God’s holiness. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. The whole earth is filled with His glory. Now, that vision of God’s holiness is also indicative of God’s actions with regard to His people.

    For they are coming under the sentence of judgment, that rightly, due to their sin. And because of that, then, God will visit His people with a chastisement, a severe chastisement. a chastisement so severe that it appears as if there is no escape whatsoever. There is, in fact, no hope. Such is the vision of God’s holiness that God’s people, in their sin, are left devastated. They are left facing the grave. Thus, the message of the exile, the coming exile, is a message of death read out over the people of God. God’s holiness, His justice, their sin, His judgment, their exile, their death. Hope? It is gone. Their circumstance and situation is utterly hopeless before God’s just judgment. Amazing.

    Isaiah is not merely the prophet of that vision of God’s holiness. He is the prophet of God’s promised comfort. As we move to the latter chapters of Isaiah, chapters 40 through 66, we see that comfort spoken of time and time again. God’s justice will come.

    The exile is certain. But there is that message of remedy. Comfort ye my people, says the Lord. We know those lines, we know that passage. Speak kindly to Jerusalem, call out to her that her warfare has ended. that her iniquity has been removed and she has received at the Lord’s hand double for all of her sins.

    Death, hopelessness in exile, but yet restoration. God’s comfort working yet for those who have no hope. If they have been given over to death by God, now He restores them and brings them back to life. If they have been given over to the grave, their restoration will mean resurrection. If the exile is death, the restoration is resurrection. That’s what’s going on. God is preparing His people for the greatness of His work which shall be consummated in the Lord Jesus Christ. For even here, in the Prophets of the Old Testament, resurrection is preached. Life out of death.

    Rescue for God’s people. even though their circumstance is utterly hopeless. We must not see ourselves far removed. It must not become to us just one more rehearsal of the same old story. For we are told that we are dead in trespasses and insults, and only because of God’s gracious work has our hopeless condition been remedied. The prophet Isaiah is not without his vision of the Lord Jesus Christ.

    While he is the prophet of God’s holiness and just judgment, the prophet of God’s promised comfort as well, restoration from exile, he is the prophet of God’s servant, that one through whom he shall achieve deliverance, through whom he shall work his salvation, the one through whom he shall accomplish atonement for his people.

    We know of the servant songs that appear in the latter portions of Isaiah’s prophecy. Some time ago, we spent some time studying four of those servant songs. We concentrated upon the most famous of those servant songs, Isaiah 53. which the servant of God is portrayed for us as that one through whom God will work his restoration. All of this spoken by a prophet who lived 700 years before the birth of Christ.

    Finally, the outcome of the work of this servant is not merely to restore us to a condition a condition that is capable of loss, interruption, diminishment. No, the work of this servant shall be unto an environment that cannot be lost, that will never be diminished in glory at all. So Isaiah the prophet, of that vision of God’s holiness, the prophet of God’s promised comfort, the prophet of God’s servant, and the prophet of the new heavens and the new earth, the point to which he has been pressing throughout the prophecy all along, so that in the concluding chapters, chapters sixty-five and sixty-six, we find him specifically speaking about the new heavens and the new earth as the end point to which he has been pressing all along. Now it is important for us as we take up specifically the particulars of this prophetic vision to catch something of the angle to the prophet’s point of view. Why is it? that when we read the Prophets, we so easily become confused. Why is it that there are only certain portions of the Prophets to which you turn? Why is it that wading through prophecy becomes an ordeal?

    Oftentimes, an experience that leaves us utterly bewildered We have trouble sorting things out. It’s not just the words they use, the references they make to various sites and locations in the ancient world, Israel and beyond. It’s not merely the allusions that they make to various features of that world in which they live, or even past history, Israel’s past history. It’s the difficulty that we have seemingly sorting out the time frames. We become confused because it’s as if a number of elements from different periods of time collide. We’re confused also because the language that the Prophet uses often seems to us much more realistic, or shall I say, unrealistic, then we can accept. In certain portions, restoration seems to bring before our eyes a gathering of all of the nations of the earth at Jerusalem.

    All the nations, not just some, all of the nations are gathered to Jerusalem for this incredible feast. Everybody’s going to have a great time at this magnificent feast. There’s going to be the best of wine and no end to it. They’re going to make their wine from bunches of grapes that weigh a hundred pounds. There’s going to be the choicest cuts of meat.

    No one do that. No one. No one gets the poor cuts. Everybody gets a choice cut. From the greatest And everybody gathered together at Jerusalem for this great feast to celebrate in such a way that there will be no emptiness in them, there will be no recollection of former times of distress, And whatever sorrows or whatever problems there have been formerly, those will be removed completely. Every eye will be dry. No sorrow, no sighing, no dissatisfaction whatsoever.

    So we have. In the language of the prophets, things that confuse us, they speak of a future time in which all present blessings seem to be heightened immeasurably. Fountains of living water pouring out from under the temple. Temple priesthood so expansive that it’s beyond even the territory of Israel. to comprehend the vision, the item. But with respect to time as well, don’t think it’s strange that you have trouble understanding. Here is the generation to which Isaiah speaks. He talks to them as if the exile were already accomplished. He lived more than a hundred years before the exiles of Phrax.

    In his day, it was the Assyrians who came down and laid siege to Jerusalem. And Isaiah sees that siege of Jerusalem as if it were a prophecy of the coming siege of the Babylon in a hundred years. Yes. And he treats that siege by the Assyrians as if it were successful, as if human. The Assyrians succeeded, they showed, and Israel, Jerusalem were laid waste. That’s it. Give it up for the devil. And in their success, carrying off the Israelites, which exile, just as they have done to the ten northern tribes, say, in 22 BC.

    So, against the background of the same, of the experiences of his own time, he’s looking forward with this eye of the spirit, and seeing things work out, he’s tearing apart, he’s becoming extracted, and it’s going to take at least 100 years yet in the future. Death is imminent. The Lord has not made a call. The circumstance is utterly hopeless. If there is any hope for forever, you must trust in the Lord.

    And where Israel is to be saved, when Jerusalem is saved, in Isaiah’s day, he’s treated as the restoration, as the resurrection. But that’s not all. As he looks down to the core of the earth, he sees distant events close at hand. He sees yet distant events close at hand, not up into the immediate district, not just the exile into Babylon in a certain white-faced place, not just the restoration, but with that, The ultimate purpose of God’s work out is final time for His people. He sees repeatedly the events of His own time, yet time, that future time of God, God said, shall come. God Himself. How was Hrusyant saying, day by day, and ideally by the coming of God? How are the Israelites going to progress from Babylon 100 years, 150, 100% years later? By the coming of God.

    But in keeping, but in keeping With that prophetic vision, Isaiah sees even beyond the advanced media and the advanced media. This is a hundred years, a hundred and seventy years’ recognition. He sees one born out into the wilderness, as if that one, born out into the wilderness, were identifying himself implicitly with the people of the new generation, That walking in the wilderness, fly back, prepare me and raise the wolf. And every mountain will be brought low, and every valley will be made numb. The Lord Himself comes.

    The kind of binoculars that the prophet has, those close, distant events, and as long as, as if he sees those distant events then, marked out for him on a mural, a big note, and there’s no differentiation time-wise with regard to anything, he sees, the rescue of Jerusalem from the Assyrians on the same plane as the rescue of Israel from the Babylonians, as he does the coming of John the Baptist in the wilderness and the appearance of God’s Messiah, and the beginning, the commencement of the day in which God will establish the new heavens and the new earth.

    He sees it all together. to those kind of binoculars, that he looks at the future. So everything comes together, and it’s not a single plane. And it’s only then, by the outwardness of God’s presented program, that everything then begins to be differentiated. He begins to make a distinction. Now, that helps us with regard to defying God. As God then works, everything starts to fall out.

    We gain the three-dimensional perspective to this mural. We begin to perceive the distant timeline between events pre-spoken. But I say, I think it all depends. He’s honing the outworking of the history of redemption that will make his plan appear to us.

    This is the mistake, I must say. This is the mistake that most of the Believers make in their understanding of prophetic literature. They refuse to take into consideration the historical exegesis that God made himself of the prophetic vision. Their binoculars still see things quite one-dimensional, ain’t they? God’s grace, however, the fact that we’re given to the Church, and we’re itself given to God’s seed, is three-dimensional.

    So that helps us timewise, but what about all of this realism for other people’s language? Here we have it. Chapter 65, verses 17 and following. You can read it there. Now let me ask you, let me ask you, of what is this a vision? What is the Lord, through Isaiah the prophet, describing for us here, in the 17th verse of the 65th chapter, earlier?

    Is it not the eternal state? Will there be any end to the new heavens and the new earth? Verse 17. Are you expecting there to be any end to the new heavens and the new earth? Do you have any reason to imagine that from what you know of Scripture and the outworking of history, there’s going to be an end to the New Heavens and the New Earth? No, you don’t!

    This is the eternal state that’s being described for you here. God is giving His answer to His people with respect to their hope. And here it is, reaching its apex. For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth. whole new environment, former things will not be remembered or come to mind,” he says. And he goes on, “…but be glad and rejoice forever in what I create. That is, what I create by way of the recreation. For behold, I create Jerusalem for rejoicing, and her peoples for gladness.”

    That’s the character of the city now. And in the city, there’s not one note of sorrow, that’s all. The city which is being established here is completely filled with rejoicing and gladness. What he’s describing here is the eternal state, and not only will the city be rejoicing, his people will be filled with gladness. That’s describing them perpetually, but he will rejoice in his city and be glad in his people.

    Verse 19. We have it given to us at the end of that verse. It will no longer be heard in her voice of weeping or the sound of crying. We know that what is being described here now is a circumstance, a situation in which distress is an impossibility and in which death cannot be true.

    So you come to verses 20 And following, particularly verse 20, what is the prophet’s intention when he talks about, no longer will there be an infant who lives but a few days. What’s the intention? Will there be any end to the life of anyone who is innocent?

    This is where people become confused. He begins to use language the intent of which is to place before you an exaggeration of such a nature that should push beyond the limits of the natural, into the realm of the supernatural. He’s not here saying to you that infants will be born and that old men will in fact live out their days with satisfaction, he is not here saying to you that the youth will in fact live only to the age of 100, and the one who does not live to the age of 100 will be thought a curse. That’s not what he’s saying. What he’s saying there is there will be no end of days for any of God’s people, and death will be a complete impossibility. Why? Because in this city there is no weeping and there is no sorrow. But how do people take this verse?

    Well, there must be coming a day in which, you see, Everybody is going to live to the age of 100 or more. And we’re going to have the perfect society on the earth. And only then can we live for hundreds of more years, and then we can be fully satisfied with our days, and we’ll die and never have to search God’s eyes anymore. This is the only way, the only way to this perfect society which is coming.

    And this is not the justice of the prophetic vision and word. We go on with verses 21 and following. They shall build houses and inhabit them. They shall plant vineyards, eat of their fruit. They shall not build, and another inhabit, and not plant, and another eat, and suffer, etc. What’s the intent here?

    The intent is between the Almighty and the perpetual One. and one that is completely unearthly. Perfect spirit. Absolute soul. He takes those elements of the life of the people of the sun and ingests with hyperbole, exaggeration, so that those things that the people know very well become the media in which they see the rest. Why in the never-ending times, show us pieces of peace for everyone, all of the nations gathered in a city that cannot be destroyed, their labor not in vain, the absoluteness of that validity for the work of their hands, their service unto God.

    Verse 24, the immediate proximity of God to them, so close, that he will answer before they call while they still speak. Verse 25, the undoing of the curse. The lamb raising together with the wolf a lion eating straw like an ox. Do you expect in glory lions and oxes, lambs and wolves? What’s the point? Those who are utterly preoccupied with millennial dreams and fantasies It seems we have to insist upon these things. The point that God is making is He is establishing perfect peace.

    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.

  • Isaiah and the New Creation

    Isaiah and the New Creation

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “New Heavens & New Earth” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, December 31, 1989.

    About this sermon

    Isaiah 51 shows the purpose and circumstances of Isaiah’s prophecy and five aspects of its message. Isaiah speaks of new heavens and a new earth centuries before John does, and he means a creation God himself makes, with Zion’s comfort bound up in it.

    More sermons from Isaiah · Browse all sermons

    Sermon transcript

    Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness and seek the Lord. Look to the rock from which you were hewn and to the quarry from which you were dug. Look to Abraham, your father, and to Sarah, who gave birth to you in pain. When he was one, I called him. Then I blessed him and multiplied him.

    Indeed, the Lord will comfort Zion. He will comfort all her waste places, and her wilderness He will make like Eden, and her desert like the garden of the Lord. Joy and gladness will be found in her, the thanksgiving and sound of the melody. Pay attention to me, O my people. Give and give ear to me, O my nation, for a law will go forth from me, and I will set my justice for a light of the people. My righteousness is near. My salvation has gone forth. On my arm, I judge the people. First, the country, as you are very good at it. On my arm, as you are very expected. Lift up your arms. to the sky, and look to the earth beneath.

    For the sky will vanish like smoke, and the earth will fall out like a comet, and its inhabitants will die in white foam. But my salvation shall be forever, and my righteousness shall not end. Listen to me, you who know me, a people of whose pardon is my law. Do not feel the reproach of men. We will be dismayed at their revival, for the moth will eat them like a garden, the grub will eat them like wool, and my luncheon shall be corrected by salvation to all generations. Awake! Awake! Put on strength, O arm of the Lord! Awake, as in days of old, generations of long gone!

    Was it not Thou who cut Rahab in pieces and pierced the dragon? Was it not Thou who dried up the sea and brought it to the great deep, and made the depths of the sea a pathway for the redeemed to cross over? So the ransom of the Lord will return, and come with joyful shouts of honor. Everlasting joy will be on their heads. They will obtain gladness and joy sorrow and silence will flee away. Ah, and even ah, and he who comforts you. Who are you that you are afraid of the man who died? Or the son of man who is made like a dragon? That you have forgotten the Lord your Maker who stretched out the heavens and laid the foundations of the earth. That you fear continuing all day long because of the fury of the as he makes ready to destroy. But where is the fury of the oppressor? The exile will soon be set free. It will not die in the dungeon, nor will this dread be laughed at.

    For I am the Lord your God, who stirs up the sea and the waves and the world. The Lord of hosts is His name. I have put my words in your mouth and have covered you with the shadow of my hand to establish the heaven found the earth to save as I am, you are my people. O Lord, your word goes forth from your throne. Who can stand in the way of your purpose? O God, your word goes forth. And who can resist? Who can resist the good of your Spirit?

    By your word, Lord, you create. By your word, you destroy. By your word, you change the face of the earth. By your word, you change the heart of man. We have been changed by your word, O God. We are placed in the company of men who have been so changed May it please you, our Father, now to grant us strength by that word, that we might live by it. And may it please you, our Father, to remind us of the company throughout the world you together profess with us, the truthfulness of the word that you have given. As they believe, so may we. May our faith be informed.

    Pray this in Jesus’ name. the time of Isaiah was a time of great upheaval in the life of the nation of Israel I think that most of you realize that Isaiah was a prophet to the southern tribes that the northern tribes during his ministry and his time of prophecy have been destroyed the capital of Samaria to the north have been destroyed by the Assyrians and the people of Israel have been taken away and captured there now stood Jerusalem to the south the territory of Judah, Benjamin The Assyrians had made their assault upon that territory as well.

    These assaults by the Assyrians were not without God’s direction. They did not come apart from His will. They came as a result of the sin of this nation. Now I’ll stop until we settle down and then I’ll go on. I do not intend to preach competing with evil tonight. It was a time of judgment. For God was visiting his people because of their sin.

    This time of judgment spoke of greater judgment still. For as the northern tribes had fallen, So Isaiah, the prophet to the southern tribes, was proclaiming to them the inevitability of judgment upon them because of their transmissions as well. If there had been exile for the ten northern tribes, there would be exile for the two southern tribes. So as this message of what seems to be the remedial judgment is read out over Jerusalem and Judah, There rises the question as to what are the purposes, the intention, the promises, the covenant of God.

    How shall God vindicate His cause? How shall God vindicate His name? How will God keep His promise? There was also that voice of fire that arose from within that territory, that voice that arose because it recognized the seriousness of the situation, acknowledged God’s justice in doing what He was doing, but yet was terrified at the prospect of the impending judgment, and terrified with respect to what was in the offing for Israel as judgment was sure to come. What of the true people of God? What of those whose faith remains firm?

    Isaiah is a prophet in the midst of such people as those true, reading out God’s judgment against the sin of the nation, but also speaking to those who are of faith, who are committed, as he is, to the purposes of God. These people who are liable to undergo this judgment now make stock of themselves, their circumstance, and despite their faith, fear begins to rise in their hearts the message of the prophet is don’t fear men, fear God don’t fear men, fear God Now there is reason to fear God.

    You may recall how Isaiah himself is summoned to be a prophet. There is that magnificent chapter in Isaiah, Isaiah chapter 6. In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord high in the sky, and His glory filled the earth. God is manifest in that temple in all of his righteousness and holiness. And one as good as Isaiah is undone. He left unsung. He said, I am a man of untamed wits, and I dwell in the midst of a people of untamed wits.

    Isaiah then is the prophet for the holiness of God, the glory of God. And while men are not to fear men, they are to fear the Son. It has been the habit of some to say that we have graduated from the Old Testament in such a way that we need not fear God anymore. Well, if you are better than Isaiah, then you can forget about fearing God. Isaiah feared God. So, after he Isaiah is not only the prophet for the holiness of God, the glory of God, that God that we are to achieve.

    He is also the prophet for the suffering servant. As Isaiah would survey the territory, even with all of his faith, as Isaiah would survey the people, even with the fear of the Lord that was resident within him. It was obvious to him that no one feared God perfectly, no one served him as he ought to be served. And while he might rise in this day to put his fear of man aside and to trust in the Lord absolutely, aspired to trust in the Lord absolutely, yet he knew in the end that he failed. So you move from Isaiah being that prophet for the holiness of God, to him being the prophet for the suffering servant of the Lord. For in the suffering servant envisioned by Isaiah, there is one who does perfectly fear God. And so perfect is his trust in God, that he does not and will not fear man. You remember the most beautiful expression of for description of that suffering servant from Isaiah 53.

    Surely He has borne our griefs, He has carried our sorrows, yet we esteem Him stricken, smitten, gone, afflicted. He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities. The chastening of our well-being fell upon Him and by His scourging. we are heathen, for we, like sheep, have gone astray, and have turned to plunders already. But the Lord has caused the iniquity of the soul to fall upon him. He is oppressed and afflicted, and yet he opened not his mouth, like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, like a sheep that is silent before its shearer. So he did not open his mouth.

    The one who perfectly fears God, and in his trust of God does not fear men. Of course we know of whom Isaiah spoke. He spoke of the coming of Christ. And if there is any hope for us in fearing God alight, if there is any hope for us in our trust of God not to fear men, it is found only in Jesus Christ. So then, Isaiah, the prophet of the holiness of God, fear God not man, the prophet of the suffering servant of the Lord, the one who for us fears God perfectly, and perfectly in faith, so expresses himself, so is not to fear man. But Isaiah is as well, the prophet of comfort. Isaiah is melted before the revelation of God in his holiness and all of his glory.

    He is sobered and humbled before the vision of the suffering servant. But because this message of the suffering servant has come together with the message about the holiness of God, consequently there is a message of comfort for the people of God. For God has not left Himself without witness, and He has not left His people without strength. He comforts His own now. by root of that one who shall come to bear iniquity and to carry away affliction even through his own body.

    Remember the opening of the section, the latter section of Isaiah’s prophecy, chapter 40, verses 1 and 2? Comfort, O comfort, my people, says your God. Speak kindly to Jerusalem and call out to her that her warfare has ended, that her iniquity has been removed, that she has received of the Lord’s hand double for all of her sins. The God then spoken of by Isaiah is a God of comfort. And that comfort is extended to the people of God who trust, those who feel pushed, constrained to fear, who need not fear.

    For the suffering servant has come for you. All that he has experienced, all that he has endured, you think for your sake. But there is one other dimension to Isaiah and his message. He is the prophet for the holiness of God. He is the prophet For the suffering servant he is the prophet of comfort, but he is also the prophet of the new heavens and the new earth.

    God, out of his fullness, and because of his righteous justice, shall bring judgment for sin. And those who trust in him even through the experiences of that judgment will see how in fact he has provided for them in the one who is offered up the suffering servant and they who are of faith and see these things will receive of him the comfort intended and they will see also in the pattern of the outworking of Israel’s history the very program of redemption that shall come to its culminations in the New Heavens and in the world.

    Yes, Assyrian assaults, and after them come the Babylonians. They will attack. They will destroy the city Jerusalem. They will leave the temple devastated, not one stone left upon another. The people will be marched eastward into Babylon itself. They will be in captivity for 70 years.

    But Isaiah’s message is one of comfort. Don’t despair. Don’t you understand that what God is doing here is unto the end of bringing about full redemption through the suffering servant, which he has described here for you, and ultimately to grant you an entirely new environment, an environment which will never be subject to adaption, never be subject to loss, never given over to defilement. never subjected to punishment as long as matters are kept within the circle of this creation they are subject to destruction, to loss, to futility God’s purpose is not to leave things in that condition, in that situation. His ultimate intention is to establish for his people an environment that will never suffer loss.

    So after the first creation comes another creation. After the first creation comes the new creation. And the pattern of the new creation, the establishment of the new heavens and the new earth, is seen in what God will do for the exiles. He will redeem them, he will bring back for himself a remnant and in so doing he will vindicate his name and reassert his purpose before the face of all the nations that purpose shall be consummated when through Jesus Christ the new heavens and the new earth are born That is what in fact Isaiah speaks of in the 51st chapter of his prophecy.

    In the 16th verse of that chapter, he talks about the privilege of those who have trusted in the Lord. God says, I have put my words in your mouth. I have covered you with the shadow of my hand. Unto the end of planting the heavens. Here you see the planting of the heavens and the establishment of the earth. The founding of the earth. Are viewed as the end point, not the beginning point. So what is in view here is not the original creation, but rather the new creation, the endpoint of God’s activity.

    The words that He has sent forth, that He has put in the mouth of His servants, the word that you have in your hand, that is inscripturated, the word that is declared to you week by week, the word that you hear, that is unto this end. The covering that you have received, the fact that you have taken up an abode under the shadow of his hand, the protection and the security that he has endured you, is unto this end! Everything is unto this end! That you might be brought to dwell in that environment that cannot suffer love, the new heavens and the new earth. Does change bother you? Does change in your world bother you? Today things are as they are, tomorrow they will be completely different. Does not being able to count on anything bother you? Does the fact that you’re getting older bother you?

    The fact that you’re going to die bother you? in this created order everything is subject to change and ultimately to dissolution and it doesn’t even matter whether you’re talking about Jerusalem and it’s temple or Israel and the order established in her and with her So all of the words that God has spoken are to this end.

    The security that you have found under the shadow of his hand, the protection that you have discovered there, the salvation which you know to be yours, this is unto that end. That the heavens might be planted afresh, established again, and the earth founded as if for the first time, And so that it might be read out in your ears, you are my people. You are my people. Now, Isaiah’s ease here is eternal. Not just another installment in Israel’s history. Not just another dispensation. What Isaiah sees here is eternal.

    And the establishment of that perpetual environment that cannot, does not suffer loss. if you are of the faith of Isaiah if you know the God that he knows if you serve the servant that he saw and prophesy about you are indeed a part of the people that he speaks of here and your place will be unshakable in the new heavens and in the new earth. O Lord, we ask that we with faith and with expectation might envision the conclusion of all of the matters of this creation not in keeping with our own imaginations but in keeping with your word may there be at the center of our lives that hope for and conviction about an unshakable and unchangeable environment O Lord, the new heavens and the new earth have in fact been established by the work of Jesus Christ and shall be unveiled with us in them in the day that is coming and in that day we will take our place in the heavens and in the new earth with Jesus Christ our Savior and also with Isaiah the prophet who served him

    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.

  • Hope Beyond Hezekiah

    Hope Beyond Hezekiah

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “New Heavens & New Earth” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, December 10, 1989.

    About this sermon

    Isaiah 36-39 ends with Hezekiah’s kingdom exposed as hopeless before Assyria, and the prophet turns away from it. From chapter 40 on, Isaiah gathers his themes around God’s own coming and his eternal kingdom. Isaiah 51 calls the faithful to look to the rock from which they were hewn.

    More sermons from Isaiah · Browse all sermons

    Sermon transcript

    Now our picture reading is from Isaiah chapter 51. And we will be reading the first 16 verses. Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness and seek the Lord. Look to the rock from which you were hewn, and to the floor from which you were dug. Look to Abraham your father and to Sarah, who gave birth to you in pain. When he was one, I called him. Then I blessed him and multiplied him. Indeed, the Lord will comfort Zion. He will comfort all her waste places, and her wilderness He will make like Eden, and her desert like the garden of the Lord. Joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and sound of a melody.

    Pay attention to me, O my people, Give and give ear to me, O my nation, for a law will go forth from me, and I will set my justice for a light of the people. My righteousness is near, my salvation has gone forth, and my arms will judge the people. The coastland will wait for me, and for my arm they will wait expectantly. Lift up your eyes to the sky, than whip to the earth beneath. For the sky will vanish like smoke, and the earth will wear out like a garment, and its inhabitants will die in white manner. But my salvation shall be forever, and my righteousness shall not wane. Listen to me, you who know righteousness, a people in whose heart is my law, Do not fear the reproach of man, neither be dismayed at their revilements. For the moth will eat them like a garment, and the grub will eat them like wool. But my righteousness shall be forever, and my salvation to all generations. Awake! Awake! Put on strength, O one of the Lord. Awake, as in the days of old the generations of long ago.

    Was it not thou who cut Rahab in pieces, who pierced the dragon? Was it not thou who dried up the sea, the waters of the great deep, who made the depths of the sea a pathway for the redeemed to cross over? So the ransoms of the Lord will return, and come with joyful shouting to Zion, and everlasting joy will be on their heads they will obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing will flee away.

    I, even I, am he who comforts you. Who are you that you are afraid of a man and God, and of the Son of Man, who is made like grass? That you have forgotten the Lord your Maker, who stretched out the heavens and laid the foundations of the earth, that you fear continually all day long because of the fury of the oppressor, as he makes ready to destroy. But where is the fury of the oppressor? The exile will soon be set free, and will not die in the dungeon, nor will his breath be lacking.

    For I am the Lord your God, who stirs up the sea and its waves raw. The Lord opposes, is His name. And I, have put my words in your mouth, and have covered you with the shadow of my hand, to establish the heavens, to found the earth, and to say to Zion, You are my King.” Let’s pray. Our Father, to the ends of the earth, your word has gone out.

    And even in the days of the Apostle Paul, the days of the state, that the gospel had been proclaimed to every creature under heaven. The Apostle saw, as it were, the accomplishment of the mission enterprise of your Church. He saw the fulfillment of that enterprise in Jesus Christ, and as certainly accomplished as was the death and resurrection of the Savior. In his place, O Lord, being your servant and having the clear eye that he did his place was to enter into the fullness of what was accomplished in and through Jesus Christ so that in the end there could be no boast from him made with respect to the things that he had accomplished for all was from you and all was a grace but surely the message goes out and your own receive it and they having received it are held well in your grasp and no one is able to pluck your own from your hand.

    Father, may we learn from your word and from the wonderful, wonderful message that has come to us which we have believed. And may it be, Lord, for the good of our soul and for your glory. We pray this in Jesus’ name. Amen. We have been thinking about the New Heavens and the New Earth. That has been our theme for a couple of weeks now and we have been looking at passages that have spoken indirectly about the New Heavens and the New Earth. On our way to take into consideration those passages that speak explicitly about the heavens and the earth using that phrase expressly. Passages we have surveyed thus far have been Hebrews 12, the latter verses, as the writer to the Hebrews reflects upon an Old Testament prophecy from Haggai, chapter 2, verse 6. With respect to a yet future and final shaping of all things, so that those things that cannot be shaken will remain.

    We have looked at 2 Corinthians 5.17, a passage that at its heart is specifically personal.

    If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation. All things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new. But we have contended that this personal renewal, effected through the reconciling work of Jesus Christ, has a cosmic significance, a cosmical significance indeed, extensive, pervasive, with respect to the transformation of all things in keeping with their appointed end, and the destiny which God himself has designed.

    Not just my personal regeneration then, not just my own personal renewal, but that seen in the context of the creational renewal, the new heavens and the new earth, which are certainly coming, and have already made their impact upon us. as we have been reborn.

    We have also included in this comment on Matthew 19, verse 28, where Jesus is concluding his remarks wherein he systematically dismantled his disciples and their expectations and preconceptions. They are anxious to get on to Jerusalem, for there they think The final and climactic order will be put in place. Oh yes, it will, but not in ways that they would have imagined. And Jesus asks them to think not in terms of that immediate resolution with respect to what awaits them in Jerusalem as they will come into an inheritance, an inheritance which they imagine which will be after the order of this creation, an inheritance which will be much along the lines of that which the which young ruler presently enjoy, the story that immediately precedes. But in light of that, you see, and those expectations, Jesus tells them about the regeneration of all things that is coming.

    And in the day of its appearance, they will be set upon twelve thrones. and the things that they have denied themselves for the sake of the kingdom will be compensated for in nature and that after the order of the new heavens and the new earth which are certainly coming tonight we are moving back behind the statements of the writer through the Hebrews behind words from the Apostle Paul, behind words from Jesus himself, to the prophecy of Isaiah, and most specifically to chapter 51 and the 16th verse of that chapter, the verse upon which we conclude.

    A verse that is to be understood in light of the scheme which we have spoken of, namely the new heavens and the new earth. For the establishment in view, the establishment of the heavens in view in that 16th verse, is not the establishment of the heavens as in creation, nor is the founding of the earth after the order of the founding of the earth in the creation originally. What is in view is the re-establishing of the heavens, a new establishing of the heavens, a new founding of the earth, the new heavens and the new earth, and the fulfillment of God’s purpose for His people who are here so identified. Now it is appropriate that as we prepare ourselves for consideration of that expressed phrase, the new heavens of the new earth, we come to the prophecy of Isaiah. For not only is Isaiah here alluding to those new heavens and new earth in this 16th verse of the 51st chapter, but later on, as his prophecy concludes, if you run on to the 65th chapter, for instance, or to the 66th chapter, you will see there that this prophet speaks expressly about those new heavens and new earth that shall certainly, surely come.

    It could be said that Isaiah, above all of the prophets, is the prophet of the new heavens and the new earth. A feat, then, that is perfected under the administration of the New Testament revelation, perfected by Jesus as he makes his proclamation to his disciples, perfected by the Spirit speaking through the Apostle Paul as he makes comments himself, bearing on this whole matter. reflected in the statements of the writer to the Hebrews, and you know, comments made by Peter in his second epistle with respect to the New Heavens and the New Earth, and again, as the Bible comes to a close, in Revelation chapter 21, the New Heavens and the New Earth, again spoken of specifically.

    My feeling has been that the Church of Jesus Christ has lost sight of the New Heavens and the New Earth. She has lost sight of her goal, and she has become very, very comfortable in this creation. Isaiah and his message. Specifically as it bears upon and as it builds up to this theme that we have before us. There is a fulcrum in Isaiah. There is something of a watershed in his prophecy. It is a narrative section of four chapters in length. chapters 36-39. Do you know of those chapters? Do their contents come to your mind as I mention them? One of the few narrative sections in Isaiah’s prophecy, the story of Hezekiah, the king. Hezekiah and his circumstance, During the days of Isaiah’s prophecy, when in fact, Hezekiah with Jerusalem was besieged by the Assyrians.

    The Assyrians having at their head an impressive general by the name of Sennacherib. Besieging the city and the throne of David, the year 701 B.C. Previously, the Assyrians have proved their might, their ability. Twenty years earlier, they had laid siege to Samaria, the capital of the northern kingdom. They had devastated that city. They had ruined the kingdom and taken off the children from those ten northern tribes into captivity. The story, then, is of God’s graciousness to Jerusalem and to this king. God’s love manifests His compassion to them as He spares the city.

    But that fulcrum section, that watershed section of Isaiah also places before us certain other considerations. Yes, the compassion of God, His mercy for the sake of David, the preservation of that throne, even a wonder of piety expressed by resident in this king as an island. For he was a lovely man, but at the same time, despite all of these wonderful and beautiful things, capped by a wonderful deliverance, an amazing deliverance, a miraculous deliverance. For city and king is a message with regard to the vulnerability of king and people, of throne and city.

    For after the deliverance, we are told that Hezekiah would have to place his house in order. The prophet makes his approach. He is told that he will die. Set your house in order, for your days are numbered. While city is spared and while Hezekiah is delivered with his people from the hand of the Assyrians, Hezekiah, this king, as glorious as he might be, is not delivered from death. Death stalks. The king is mortal. There is a fiercer enemy than Sennacherib and his horde. There is an enemy more terrible than the armies of Assyria. That enemy is death. The King, be he as wonderful an anticipation of the glorious King, the eternal King, who shall sit upon the throne of David forever.

    For this king, though resilient in his piety, is also a man victimized by his own pride. You remember how, upon his recovery, graciously from God, Recovery is sent to him. The Babylonians hear of it, and they send emissaries bearing presents. And in his vanity, in his pride, Hezekiah parades before the eyes of these Babylonians, all of the treasures of the house of David. the mortality of the king, the vanity and the pride, yes, the sinfulness of this king, one so great, weakened, fatally so. And this city that has been spared to that city now comes forth through the prophet. As the prophet addresses the king, those Babylonians before whom you have paraded proudly, vainly, they shall return and carry away all the treasures which you have shown them. And in the end, the city will be destroyed and not one stone will be left upon another.” The mortality of the king. His vulnerability through pride and vanity, and the vulnerability of that city itself.

    If Israel is looking to her king for something permanent, if she is looking to her king for something that is perfect, if she is looking to her city, Jerusalem, as something that is invulnerable. Crisis has come that has now invaded into the consciousness of those like Isaiah, the consideration of the instability and new currents of everything they see, even of those who sit upon David’s throne. and that sitting in which they might well sit. Now that is the full conception of Isaiah’s prophecy. And to that you can add all that has gone before, with regard to the sentences that have now been read out by this prophet over Israel as a whole.

    Not just the nations, not just oracles against them, laying them waste, speaking about their mortality, their vulnerability. The fact that their empires and kingdoms will crumble, become as dust, No. For the Lord has a case against his own people. And if we turn our gaze from the King and look at them, things are even more depressing. For they have abandoned the true God. Their worship has become compromised, mercilessly. And they find themselves now under the edict. God will judge. God will judge, he will destroy. His just sentence is read out over the heads of the people.

    We spoke this morning about the hopelessness of Elizabeth’s circumstance. Now read Isaiah and hear about the hopelessness of the condition of God’s people as Isaiah addresses that. So we come then to Isaiah 40 through 66. And maybe as sublime a section of the prophets as has ever been said before us. In those chapters there are at least three themes that are put before you. Against the background of Israel’s hopeless condition, against the background of the judgment that is being read out over her and the testimony that now rises with regard to her vulnerability, her compromised condition.

    And as it is apparent now that there is no one, yes no one, to whom she can turn who can in fact deliver her. Against the background of all of this comes that glorious message of consummate mercy. Comfort, comfort you my people. She has received the double for all of her sins. And now I will visit her with my mercy. How magnificent the manifestation of that mercy.

    For the Lord tells us that in visiting the people with mercy, He Himself will do it. So the first theme from all others that is enunciated by Isaiah in these chapters is this, God will come. God Himself, prepared you the way of the Lord, so calleth the voice from the wilderness. God Himself is coming. And He brings with Him justice and mercy in the heart.

    Now the second thing, the second thing has to do with the figure of Hezekiah and the answer to him. For just as Hezekiah has proved himself vulnerable and mortal. As that has all been displayed, unquestionably, and as it is now evident that there is no servant for the Lord in Israel by whom God will in fact work his purposes, The corollary theme that arises with the fact that God himself is coming is that the servant of the Lord, par excellence, shall make his appearance. And this one will be not merely for the sake of exhibiting a perfect obedience to the will of God, but for bearing the mortality and the vulnerability of his people, Samarra, in himself. conclusively, so that they, by root of him, might live.

    Joined to the message, then, of the coming of God is the message of the servant of the Lord, that one by whom we will be saved, that one whose strife will be for our healing, Like sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way, but the Lord has laid upon him the iniquity of us all.” The great God, the humble servant.

    To what end? that they might be restored to another administration where another king proves his vulnerability, his mortality, another king overcome by his pride and vanity, his sinfulness, another kingdom where block upon block, stone upon stone is capable of being dismantled, torn down, A circumstance subject to dissolution, capable of being unmade, if not destroyed altogether. Not on your life. Not on your life. And that is why, you see, all of the critics are wrong. They want to set the stage for these latter chapters of Isaiah in the day of the exodus.

    It’s not far-reaching enough, for the vision Isaiah is beyond the restoration of the Messiah. and to the restoration of all things, and the establishment of the new heavens, and the newer, beyond, near, return to Palestine, Israel, to Jerusalem, to the rebuilding of walls and the Temple there.

    But unto that order, very firmly, indestructibly, return at once. incapable of dissolution. That order into which it is impossible for guilt to occur cannot occur. That order into which sin cannot occur is impossible. That order in which all sin and crime Are they me? They’re the order. That order in which there is absolutely no doubt in your mind whatsoever that you are the people of God. No doubt. Not even in the presentation. And how tragic. And how tragic.

    We might say that in Isaiah’s day, there was adequate reason for the confusion, the misunderstanding, the blurred vision of the people to whom he spoke. But what of us? Are we Jews all over again? living as it were before the great day to which Isaiah looked. As if the events that have transpired in and through Jesus Christ have never happened, as if our vision had not been cleared and our understanding straightened out by his appearance, Is there an unreconstructed Jew lurking within your soul and within your heart to demand it and reclaim desperately to this significant other?

    This is what he wants. But in giving yourself to this order, you deceive yourself by thinking that you will have the eternal order too. No, you won’t. No, you won’t. You will not be given to it. And we follow God, we know that’s true, even though He presently persists in your attitude. Isaiah, the messenger of a new order, a new administration of the new heavens and the new earth which is perfect answer to the dilemma that overtakes Israel with respect to her king and that nation in which there had been such hope such expectation Why there is something much glorious now. Something much glorious that is yours. And by faith you see it. And by faith you seize it.

    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.

  • Unto Us a Child Is Born

    Unto Us a Child Is Born

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Christmas” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, December 25, 1988.

    About this sermon

    In Scripture birth means hope and barrenness means hopelessness, and God shows his power where hope has run out. In Isaiah 9:6, God’s barren people give birth to Christ. The child rules with strength.

    More sermons from Isaiah · Browse all sermons

    Sermon transcript

    Tonight we are reading from the prophecy of Isaiah. We are beginning with a part of the 8th chapter and we will be reading into the 9th. This is Isaiah chapter 8 beginning with verse 16. bind up the testimony, seal the law among my disciples. And I will wait for the Lord who is hiding his face from the house of Jacob. I will even look eagerly for him. Behold, I and the children whom the Lord has given me are for signs and wonders in Israel from the Lord of hosts who dwells on Mount Zion.

    And when they say to you, consult the mediums and the wizards who whisper and mutter, should not a people consult their God? Should they consult the dead on behalf of the living to the law and to the testimony? If they do not speak according to this word, it is because they have no dawn.

    And they will pass through the land hard pressed and banished And it will turn out that when they are hungry they will be enraged and curse their king and their God as they face upward. Then they will look to the earth and behold distress and darkness, the gloom of anguish, and they will be driven away into darkness.

    But there will be no more gloom for her who was in anguish. In earlier times he treated the land of Zebulon and the land of Naphtali with contempt, but later on he shall make it glorious by the way of the sea on the other side of Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles. The people The walk in darkness will see a great light. Those who live in a dark land, the light will shine on them.

    Thou shalt multiply the nation. Thou shalt increase their gladness. They will be glad in thy presence as with the gladness of harvest, as men rejoice when they divide the spoil. For thou shalt break the yoke of their burden and the staff on their shoulders, the rod of their oppressor, as at the battle of Midian.

    For every boot of the booted warrior in the battle tumult and the cloak rolled in blood will be for burning, fuel for the fire. For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us, and the government will rest on his shoulders and his name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. There will be no end to the increase of his government or of peace on the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. the zeal of the Lord of hosts will accomplish.

    Father, there is every obstacle to our devotion compounded for. even at these times where you are to be so central to our thinking. You are pushed from our consideration by concerns for the world, concerns for ourselves. We are even liable to make idols out of things that should not, must not be worshipped. Our children, our families, thinking more of them than we do of you. O Lord, we beseech you, teach us your truth from your word, that we might live as pleases you.

    For Jesus’ sake. Amen. In the Bible, through the life, it is the child, the child, again and again, that becomes the sign of hope. It is the child that becomes the sign of hope. Let your mind wander back across Scripture. Think of things from the beginning. The circumstances after the fall of Adam and Eve into sin. Think of the man and his wife who received a message of hope in the figure of a child.

    There was the promise given to Eve. Her seed would come, triumphing over Satan in time. That seed would crush the head of the serpent, while in fact his heel would be bruised. Did Eve have this promise in mind when Cain was born? You can read the opening of the fourth chapter of Genesis. There we are told that Eve brings forth her firstborn.

    She gives him the name Cain, a name that signals something related to the idea of the coming or the appearance of the man. She had received the man from the Lord. Was it that she saw in this one something of her hope? Of course, her hopes were dashed as Cain turned out to be a murderer. He killed her second born, Abel.

    And then there came Seth, and once more hopes revived through Seth, that the line of promise is yet intact. We move on in the story of redemption. We come to the sixth chapter of Genesis. We read of a man named Lamech. His son is named Noah. And Lamech looks at that child as if in that child he perceives the fulfillment of the promise, the realization of the hope. The name Noah means rest. Would then God give humanity rest through this one Noah who had been born? the child, again and again, a signal, a sign, a quote.

    And that is precisely the way it is when we come to the prophecy of Isaiah. Once more, it is the child, the child, that is to be the sign the signal of God’s redemptive purpose and power. This child, spoken of in Isaiah’s prophecy, shall in fact be assigned to Jerusalem, concerning her deliverance during the days of a particularly wicked king by the name of Ahab.

    The king does not believe in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He does not believe in the God of Isaiah. He is one who epitomizes unbelief. And when the prophet comes to him in good faith, at the direction of the Lord, and invites him to ask for a sign, he rejects the sign and the God who extends it to him. But then there comes the response of the Lord through the prophet, and Isaiah tells Ahaz, Therefore, even though you disbelieve The Lord himself will give you a sign.

    Behold, a virgin, a virgin shall conceive and bring forth a son, and she shall call his name Emmanuel. Translated it means, God with us. Here I am quoting from the 7th chapter of Isaiah’s prophecy, the 14th verse. As with the birth of a child, new life not only appears but touches everyone around. So it is in the person of this child, for through this child spoken of by the prophet, God preaches hope to his people, a hope which means for them an entirely new start a completely new beginning. But as hope springs up within hearts at the birth of a child, at the event of that birth, so by contrast, by reversal Hopelessness.

    Hopelessness is seen to be joined to the tragedy that stalks humanity in barrenness. With birth, hope. With barrenness, hopelessness. Therefore, as we run through scripture and we take into account the series of births through which hope is revived, we are also there instructed by many stories that speak to us about barrenness.

    Barrenness over against hope and life is a testimony to inability, futility, a testimony to death. over against birth and hope, barrenness communicates then inability and places one before God in such a way that one must confess, accept God at my situation. Our situation is utterly, completely hopeless. What woman can make herself unbearable? Who can make themselves able to produce? Who can alter the predicament as we review the stories in Scripture? Do you remember Sarah? A woman who could not conceive?

    She will never mother a child. So impossible is her circumstance unless God intervened himself. Think of Hannah, the mother of Samuel, the prophet. She too was barren. Her reproach, her disgrace within the nation of Israel remains unless God, in His mercy, Here’s her prayer and answers. These women then, in their barrenness, are lessons to us concerning the people of God as a whole. For it says, if in the woman is the people, in seeing them, the woman, you see the people as a whole. that for which the people then hope, cannot be realized by them left to themselves. That for which they hope cannot be conceived, it cannot be brought forth, except by God.

    Note the circumstances in Israel’s day. The nation is divided, North and South. to the north of the ten tribes called Israel proper to the south are two tribes, Judah and Benjamin, described as Judah, with Jerusalem as the capital. In Israel’s case now, the northern tribes, for them Hopelessness has settled in upon these people painfully, as they are confronted with their dissolution as a nation, the destruction of their capital, and the exile of the people.

    Now you have the people in the South looking northward. They look northward only to see the ten northern tribes annihilated, destroyed for their sin. That judgment which they have observed to the north is presently moving southward. It is being brought through the Assyrian army, who were described as the Nazis of the ancient world.

    The Assyrians are besieging Judah and Jerusalem, and Isaiah has made it clear that the reason why this assault has come is because of the sin of Judah and the tragedy of the life of the nation. Irreversible judgment seems imminent. That irreversible judgment sealed for the tribes in the north and now looming on the horizon in the south.

    That judgment we are told As we look at the end of the eighth chapter of Isaiah, which we’ve read this evening, brings with it famine, brings with it such insurrection that no authority within the land will be able to prevail, brings with it the blasphemous rejection of God himself. Before the eyes of those judged Nothing appears in the land now but the stress and darkness, the bloom of hopelessness, and the next stop, oblivion. That’s a rather bleak picture as you come to the end of the eighth chapter of Isaiah.

    But now, seemingly, it is all reversed. For man is brought to the limit. He is exposed as one who has no strength in himself, one who in fact brings judgment upon himself for his sin, only then to see God intrude upon him, his life, in order to resurrect hope. Hope will come from no one else but from God. So now, as the ninth chapter begins in Isaiah, God is stepping in to announce that just when things are bleakest, when they are completely and utterly hopeless, just then he will act.

    Why? Because then it will be apparent that only he can save. Only he can save. Maybe you’re confused about your life. You don’t understand why things are going the way they are. Things don’t improve, they just get worse. Life seemingly more complicated all the time. You’re distressed at your wit’s end. Learn the lesson. God will bring you to the end of yourself, that you might begin afresh.

    He acts precisely in that environment where nothing but himself can bring hope, where no one but him and his purpose can bring resurrection. Thus it is that The prophecy of Isaiah makes such a point of bringing before us the fate of the northern tribes, already judged and vanquished. And it’s precisely to that territory that the prophet turns in his message. He turns to Galilee of the Gentiles. He turns to the land of Zebulon and Naphtholat. Those are northern tribes. already judged, already vanquished. From that territory, says the prophet, from the barren north, the glory of the Lord and the dawn of his redeeming grace will shine forth.

    And now it is through this ninth chapter, this almost incomparable ninth chapter of Isaiah, the magnificent picture builds for us through the imagery of the irrepressible light, that he’s going to shine forth from God and his activity in answer to the darkness and gloom. If there was the void and the darkness at creation, into which God spoke and said, let there be light, now you see the gloom and the darkness overshadows once more, compounded all the more because of the threat of death and the tyranny of death. God speaks once more about light. There will be the multiplication of joy in answer to distress and hopelessness.

    Liberation is effective. Such liberation as is comparable to when Israel in the days of the judges was under the yoke of Midian and through that rather bizarre and surprising hero Gideon, the nation, is liberated. What do we do with the figure of Gideon? I know what we do with him. We try to turn him into some sort of spiritual hero.

    You missed the point. Gideon wasn’t a great man of faith. He didn’t have any faith at all. You know, he used to put the Lord to the test. He said, well, if the dew is on the fleece and not on the ground, then I’ll go dwell. This time, put it on the ground and not on the fleece, then I’ll believe you. He wasn’t a man of faith. He wasn’t a man of great strength.

    It was through this man who seemingly epitomizes weakness that God effected his deliverance. At the end of all of this that the Lord is accomplishing for the sake of his great name, there is the perpetuation of a rule, a rule of peace. the fifth verse of that ninth chapter, every soldier’s boot will be burned. Every sponge used to mop up the blood will be destroyed. And the source, the source of this great reversal The reason for the end of the hopelessness and the despair, the darkness and the gloom, the reason for the arrival of such blessings as are spelled out for us here, it is the birth of a child. Through one so utterly weak and helpless, God is going to manifest His power, and that’s the mystery of the kingdom.

    You don’t expect it, you don’t even recognize it. In the figure then of the child, hope is preached and hopelessness is answered. We are told in this sixth verse of the ninth chapter, we are told this, for a child will be born to us. Now, I want you to catch hold of the imagery of that line, for a child will be born to us. You might think that, well, he’s just referring to the fact that there’s a child born into the family and all the light and the birth of the child. Well, that’s not the power of the line at all.

    You see, the people altogether, the us of that passage, are conceived out here as the mother. You are the mother. The people of God are the mother, giving birth to the child. The people then are seen. under the figure of the mother as, if you will, giving birth to this one who is their hope.

    But that birth of hope is not to be understood as some sort of natural occurrence, as if the power to do and accomplish such a thing resided with the people, resided with the people of God, resided with us. Could be brought about by our own strength. For you see, the prophecy goes on. It says a son will be given, underscore that, given to us.

    The son must be given to us, because we as a people, conceived under the figure of a woman, are as a barren woman, incapable of producing a child by our own strength. God alone, then, accomplishes the mighty work. And the fact that he must give the Son accents, magnifies, his grace. What is grace? It’s God’s gift, undeserved. His love, extended, undeserved. how great that work appears.

    However, when running it through once more in positive lines, we observe the degree of difficulty compounded infinitely. For the woman chosen, through whom ultimately the child will be born, is not one who is simply barren. who needs simply a rearrangement, we might say physiologically or with respect to chemistry, in order to produce a child.

    No, you see, the woman in view ultimately will be not just one barren, not one barren at all, but, as we were told in Isaiah 7.14, a virgin. A virgin. all of the power of God, all of the power of God.

    The calling of this child, even though here a child ascribed to us is to rule, a child who rules seemingly from birth And he shall rule in a way, in such a way, so as to contrast the misrule that has been observed in Israel to the north and is presently observed in Judah in the south.

    No longer moral and spiritual indulgence at the expense of Jehovah the Lord. Neither is this one ill-suited for rule. as if childish or irresponsible. He always remembers, you see, whose child he is. He is the one who has been given by God, but he is, after all, our child. He is the child of the people of God. He rules for us, and his rule is faithful.

    So he alone has strength to bear the load. How peculiar a child with strength to bear the load of righteous governance. Calvin says, the discharge of his office will not be daintily with his fingertips, but with the full strength of his arm of might.

    The Shorter Catechism says that Christ is our King, in that he subdues us to himself, in that he rules and defends us, in that he restrains and conquers all his and our enemies. But it is specifically now as child that he is portrayed here in this prophecy. He is portrayed in power as a child, and once more that mystery of the kingdom hits us full face. The irony of God’s dealings with the world That irony being that our powerlessness is remedied by one who is himself seemingly so absolutely powerless. But note how the verse ends. You see, this child is portrayed here as our child. And as our child, we name him. We name him. And what is the name that we give to him?

    He is the counsel, the wonderful counsel, or, as a counselor, a wonder. In his counseling, in his wisdom, incomprehensible, exceeding all human capability, dumbfounding even those who have been schooled in all that the tribes of Israel could produce with respect to wisdom. before him and his counsel, we, with them, are left speechless. He is the last counselor, the counselor who has no need of any other counselor. He needs no staff of advisors.

    And when we see that we have been preserved by his counsel, his wonderful counsel, then we name him, confess him, as that wonderful counselor, the one in whom is hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. But we call him also Mighty God. Here is no king who needs, who leaves his advice suspended in air, who leaves his political theory somehow in the realm of the theoretical dangling, if you will. He is not one who is just there giving you pious advice, offering you words that would come forth from the sages of our time, sort of an intergalactic Dear Abby. Nor is he one who is to be cooped up in the sterile quarters of a counseling center.

    Rather, he executes his counsel by the power of his might, for, you see, in his might he is a god. And he proves the match for any created force that would arise to counter his rule. and in him we are enabled to endure against all forces, seen and unseen.

    Although our child, he is our God. Although our child, he is also our Father, for that is what the passage says. Irony of ironies, we call him the eternal father, or if you will, the father of eternity. That is, the one from whom issues the age to come. All eternity springing forth from him. In him we behold the author of eternal life. He is the father of it all. Life eternal proceeds from him. And as father to his children, those who would name him as such, he gives life in the age to come and tenderly cares for them that they might attain unto it.

    And finally, we named him the Prince of Peace. What of that former anguish, that former distress, that former hopelessness, we are ones congregated before this one, and in his presence, anguish, distress, darkness, gloom, hopelessness are banished forever. There is peace that comes that is more than a mere word. There is peace that comes that is more than a warm feeling. Here is peace that transcends this world and its ability to give the same. Here is peace that is everlasting, not of this world, but of the world to come. A peace which passes all understanding, capable of guarding heart and mind in Christ Jesus.

    We have confessed the song by naming him. All human titles are inadequate as we take our place in the train of all those who have so acknowledged. Will you stand with Isaac? Or do you keep company? with Ahaz. It’s as simple as that. It’s as simple as that. You stand with Isaiah or you keep company with Ahaz. There are only two choices.

    To stand with Isaiah means that you will stand with Thomas, who, before the risen Lord, fell to his knees, confessing, My Lord and My God. To stand with Isaiah puts you in the company of the fathers of the Church, who at Nicaea confessed that Jesus was God of God, light of light, very God of very God. And it puts you in the line of the Westminster Assembly that confessed Jesus Christ to be the very eternal God. So what have you seen?

    Can you pick up your Bible, can you turn to Isaiah chapter 9 verse 6, can you read that verse as if you in it were naming the child? Is he, is he after all your wonderful counselor, your mighty God, your eternal Father, your Prince of Peace. Well, if He is, let me say this, you will live forever in light and blessings. If He is not, your judgment has already been prefigured by the destruction and dissolution of Israel. Our Lord, at this time of year, may we take to heart the message that is laid before us, and that clearly, Will we not then name the child? O Lord, and name him with that full appreciation and comprehension of who he is. A child for us, a son given to us, through whom our hopelessness and despair due to sin and death has been removed. Praise be to You, our God.

    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.