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.

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.