Two Journeys

Pastor Andy Davis preaches a verse-by-verse expository sermon on Isaiah 30:1-33. The main subject of the sermon is how God interrupts our absurd plans to acquire salvation apart from Him.

Open in your Bibles, if you would, to Isaiah chapter 30. Looking this morning, at this magnificent chapter. One of the hardest parts of the Christian life, I think, is waiting. God is calling on us to wait as he does. That I can prove it's part of the Christian life is not difficult. You can think about the end of 1 Thessalonians 1, where Paul celebrates the conversion of the Thessalonians. And the report that came back to him of what God had done in those people. He says, "They tell how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God and to wait for his Son from Heaven, Jesus Christ who rescues us from the coming wrath." Do you see those two verbs? To serve and to wait, that's what we're called on to do. We're called on to wait on the Lord. And so there are many verses in the New Testament that celebrate, that command, patience, the need for perseverance or patience. That we must wait under the hand of God. That we must humble ourselves and array ourselves under his mighty hand. That in due time, he may lift us up.

And that waiting is hard, but it's absolutely essential to our salvation. “Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.” Patience. What's that for but waiting? Perseverance must finish its work so that you'll be mature and complete, not lacking anything. So the journey from immaturity to maturity is a long one, it doesn't happen quickly, and you must have patience. And you must have patience during trials, that's the hard part. Waiting is hard, but it's essential to our future inheritance. It says in Hebrews 6:12 that we are to, “Imitate those who, by faith and patience, inherit what has been promised.” You won't inherit without patience, so you must wait. You must wait day after day, it's just a central part of the everyday Christian life, but it's also a unique challenge for some people who are going through extreme trials.

I think about the Parishes, they have been waiting for Andy's healing since the accident happened, and they continue to wait. It's a severe trial of waiting. I think about our brothers and sisters in persecuting parts in the world. I think about pastors that are incarcerated for their faith, and they're waiting for their release, they're waiting for God to answer their prayers, so are their wives and their children and their churches, waiting that God would set them free. There's some under chronic pain, severe pain, and they're just waiting for deliverance, just waiting to be set free. God is just saying, ‘No, not yet. You just need to wait.’ 

And the gist of this text here is that if we don't wait under God's hand, we are displaying faithlessness, a sinful faithlessness. We need to wait, as one pastor put it, “In God's place and at God's pace.” It's good to remember that, isn't it? Wait where God has you, and wait there as long as God wants you to stay there. Let him choose the pace and in many cases it’s gonna be a lot slower than you want. God wants us to wait. To wait on him, because that's what he's doing, he's waiting. And I know it's not easy, but it's of the essence of faith. And what I wanna do in this sermon today is to teach you how to wait. To teach you how to wait on the Lord. To teach you how to let God's word speak hope into your heart so that you wait well. Because we're so impatient.

Do you see that in your own life? I see it in myself, and I wouldn't say every time I drive, but many times that I drive. I must know that when everybody ahead of me is driving too slowly, something's wrong with all those people. Sooner or later, the Spirit says, ‘No, it's you.’ [laughter] Driving home just the other day, and one slow driver turned off and the next one turned on right in front of me. And I said, “Meet the new boss, same as the old boss." I said that out loud. Didn't I? Some kids who were with me. Didn't I say that out loud? "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss." I was impatient that day. Now, it's funny we laugh, but this is a plague to my soul. It is unbelief to not wait under God's hand. It's unbelief. And in our text, God calls it out. He calls his stubborn children out for not waiting for him and waiting on him, for making plans of their own, going their own way. 'Cause here's the deal, when you are on the highway of life, and God's providence calls on a mudslide, like happened to us in Nepal, and you're stopped. There are two ways to show unbelief in that situation, two different ways. The first is to grow overwhelmed with discouragement and quit the journey. It happens in divorce, it happens in a lot of settings. To just give up the ministry, people turn their backs and say, ‘This is just too hard,’ they give up the mission field. They give up the ministry, and I'm not saying that it's wrong to leave the mission field, or to even leave the ministry of God leads to do something else. But there are some situations in which it's done by unbelief because the people aren't willing to wait. So they quit, 'cause it's hard, they quit. That's one way. The other way, again, to stay with the bumper to bumper, traffic stop analogy, is to pull off on the shoulder and go four wheeling. You know what I'm saying? To go across someone's front lawn, ‘Now I have got a four-wheel drive, let's see what it can do.’ Take matters in your own hands and go in a way God has not told you to go, not by his Spirit, to go solve the problem yourself and get rolling again. And we do that, we do both of those. We quit or we just take matters in our own hands and go when God is telling you to wait on him.

So that's what Isaiah 30 is about. The context here is, again the southern kingdom of Judah, King Hezekiah and Assyria, that vicious conquering nation is coming, they're coming. They're probably already there. They are probably already fighting and coming. And Judah has basically four choices: they can go out and meet them in battle, they can fight them, and then retreat to the fortress of Jerusalem and fight them there. The problem with that is they're gonna lose. The Assyrians are far stronger than they are, and they're gonna lose, they've won everywhere. They can submit to them, they can surrender. The problem is with that is that many of the men are gonna die, women ravished and the whole nation enslaved, 'cause that's just who the Assyrians were. They can send emissaries with gold and silver to some powerful nation nearby, to ally with them and come help them militarily. Or they can repent from their sins and wait on God for supernatural deliverance. And what they choose to do is that third option. It's just regular habit pattern of that little southern kingdom of Judah, they do it again and again and again, you just have to trace it out. Maybe I have noticed the pattern. But when the northern kingdom of Israel threatened them militarily. They were enemies, they were not allies, they were enemies. When the northern kingdom of Israel threatened them, they made an alliance with Syria, Damascus. When Israel and Syria threatened them together, they made an alliance with Assyria, the vicious northern empire. One commentator said that's very much like a mouse being threatened by a larger mouse asking a cat for deliverance, ‘Sure, I'll come help you. I'll be happy to. I'm coming right your way.’ Devours in both. Now threatened by Assyria, what do they do? Turn to Egypt and make the same kind of mistake, the same kind of alliance. When God was calling on them to repent and to wait. 

God gives timeless, unchanging counts, and look at verse 15, Isaiah 30, and verse 15, “This is what the Sovereign Lord, the Holy One of Israel, says: “In repentance and rest is your salvation. In quietness and trust is your strength.”" That's his advice through the prophet, ‘This is what I'm telling you to do, you wanna be delivered? Do that.’ And then in verse 18, very, very sweetly, very beautifully, he says this, and this is really for me, verse 18, the centerpiece of the chapter. I'm gonna translate a little bit differently than NIV, "The Lord waits to be gracious to you; he exalts himself to show you compassion. For the Lord is a God of justice. Blessed are all who wait for him!" So at the beginning of verse 18, the Lord is the one waiting, at the end of the verse, he speaks a word of blessing to all of those who will join him in waiting. God waits. It's mysterious, the Sovereign God, “All day long, I have held out my hands to a disobedient and obstinate people.” He's a waiting God, and yet sovereign over people's hearts, it's a mystery to me, but he waits. He waits for the right time for everything in the fullness of time, he does all things. And at end of that verse, verse 18, he promises a blessing to you if you'll wait on him. But in this chapter, these people were seizing control, taking hold of the situation and moving out, four-wheeling, if you know what I'm saying, going across people's lawns and fields of corn to get where they wanted to go.

 So look at verses 1-7, you see that, “"Woe to those", says the prophet, "Who make plans to save themselves." God speaks a word of prophetic judgment. A prophetic woe. In verse one, "Woe to the obstinate children," declares the Lord, "to those who carry out plans that are not mine, forming an alliance, but not by my Spirit, heaping sin upon sin."” So he speaks his prophetic word of woe to Judah for doing this. He calls them obstinate children, stubborn children, stubborn in their own ways. They are his children. Isaiah 1:2 says, "Hear, O heavens! Listen, O earth! For the Lord has spoken: “I reared children and brought them up, but they have rebelled against me." So these are the stubborn children, the obstinate children, he's talking to them. And what is their sin? Well, making and trusting in and acting on plans that don't come from God. ““They're carrying out plans that are not mine,” declares the Lord, “Forming an alliance, but not by my Spirit.”” They are moving out, away from God, doing it their own way. And God is able to give wisdom and counsel, he's able to send godly messengers, prophets who will speak the truth. We'll talk about them a little bit later. But God is able to tell you the truth, he's able to speak to you, he's able to direct you. Look at verse 21, "Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you saying, 'This is the way; walk in it.'" God is able to give counsel, He's able to give advice, but they're not listening, they're not asking, they'd already made up their mind what they're gonna do. They were not waiting under God's mighty hand. And so in verse two, "Who go down to Egypt without consulting me; who look for help to Pharaoh's protection, to Egypt's shade for refuge." Do you see that phrase? Without consulting me. 

Convicting for me is the simple question: How many prayerless decisions do I make in a day? How many times do I decide weighty things and don't even ask God? It's convicting. It's convicting. They didn't even ask me. They just went to Egypt without consulting me. And he said, "Heaping sin upon sin." What that means is there was sin that was bringing the Assyrians, now they're adding to the sin. And what was the sin? The violation of God's laws. Their sexual immorality, their idolatry, their false religions, their drunkenness, their love of luxury, all of these things. These are the sins, that's the sin, and now they're heaping sin upon sin by seeking to remedy the problem themselves, saving themselves. Instead of falling on their faces and asking God's forgiveness, they send emissaries down to Egypt with gold to form an alliance, "But not by my Spirit," says the Lord.”

This is the essence of my problem and yours as well, isn't it? Moving out, not consulting God, not asking his wisdom, not moving by the power of the Spirit, doing your own thing in the flesh? And why Egypt of all places? Why go back to Egypt? Have we forgotten our history? Centuries before God beat them, badly, remember? They were your captors, you were enslaved by them. 400 years. And God sent Moses and God bared his holy arm and poured out wrath on Egypt, 10 dreadful plagues. And then when Pharaoh pursued with his army, God destroyed the whole army in the Red Sea. Egypt is nothing. So why would you go to a defeated enemy like that that enslaved you? Why go back to Egypt? Why would you do that? And God had said specifically, in Deuteronomy, right before they entered the promised land, ‘Don't go back to Egypt. Don't ever go back there again.’ It says in the instructions to the king in Deuteronomy 17:16, "The king moreover," he says, "Must not acquire great numbers of horses for himself or make the people return to Egypt to get more of them, for the Lord has told you, “You must not go back that way again.” No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of heaven. Don't look back, remember Lot's wife. Don't look back. Why are you going back to Egypt for help? Have you forgotten who crushed Egypt? He's the one you ought to be dealing with. And he says very plainly, the prophet says, ‘It's not going to help you. It will not help you.’ Look at verse three, "But Pharaoh's protection will be your shame, Egypt's shade will bring you disgrace." Shame and disgrace follow that kind of bad decision making. Shame and disgrace follows, moving out, four-wheeling, so to speak, pulling out on the shoulder and going across someone's yard because you can't wait on God and ask him what to do and wait for his timing. It brings shame and disgrace. It's not going to help you. Verses four and five, "Though they have officials in Zoan and their envoys have arrived in Hanes, everyone will be put to shame because of a people useless to them, who bring neither help nor advantage, but only shame and disgrace." I don't think Isaiah could have said it any more plainly. It will not help you, don't send the money. Don't do it.

Actually, in verses six and seven, Isaiah takes a bit of a humorous look. He says I wanna speak in oracle about the animals of the desert between Judah and Egypt. Let's talk about the animals. So it's a little, “oracle about the animals of the Negev:” he says, “Through a land of hardship and distress,” it's almost like a little vignette, like a mini motion pictures. You get to this picture in your mind, “Through a land of hardship and distress, desert land, picture deserts, and lions and lionesses and adders and darting snakes. The envoys are moving through, the envoys carrying their riches on donkeys’ backs, their treasures on humps of camels to that unprofitable nation, to Egypt, whose help is utterly useless. Therefore, I call her Rahab, the do-nothing.” So just picture in your mind's eye, these poor beasts of burden, carrying precious metals that are inevitably dense and heavy, those poor animals, those poor donkeys and camels, and all of it for nothing, as they go down to Egypt. The envoys will certainly welcome them gladly and take their money, but nothing good is gonna come from it. Verses 1-7, God speaks a word of woe to Judah for even doing it. The fact that they add sin to sin, and they will not deal with God, who is the real issue, instead they're making their own plans and moving out in their own direction.

In verses 8-17, he speaks a word of woe to those who want prophets to speak pleasant lies to them. And it's interesting, Isaiah in verse eight was commanded to write this prophecy down. Thank God he did, that's why we're here today, looking at his words, 'cause God told him to write it, write it down. And so, the writing prophets, they have left for us a record of God's word, and it's timeless, He's speaking to us today. God intended to speak to us today, because he commanded Isaiah to write it down. So look at verse eight, "Go now, write it on a tablet for them, inscribe it on a scroll, that for the days to come it may be an everlasting witness." So, they had the word and even more written down, but they didn't listen. They're not listening to it. The hardness of their heart is exposed, verse nine, “These are rebellious people, deceitful children, children unwilling to listen to the Lord's instruction.” Again and again in Isaiah, it's "Hear, O heavens! Listen, O earth!" again and again, God speaks and we must listen. But these are rebellious children, and they are not willing to listen. God again and again sent, what he called, my servants, the prophets, ‘I sent my servants, the prophets to you and you just didn't listen.’ 

So whenever there was this external threat, God would send a message telling them what to do. Go out and surrender, stand and fight, go out, but don't bring any weapons, just go and sing and I'll destroy them. I mean, he'll tell them, it's something different every time, but ‘Just listen to me and I'll tell you what to do.’ But the people didn't wanna listen. Now, that doesn't mean they didn't want preaching, oh, they want preaching, they want a certain kind of preaching. They wanted some people to come and tell them some things, they were eager for that. Look at verses 10-11, "They say to the seers," prophets, ““See no more visions!” and to the prophets, “Give us no more visions of what is right! Tell us pleasant things, prophesy illusions. Leave this way, get off this path and stop confronting us with the Holy One of Israel!”" Oh, is that powerful. They didn't want God, they didn't want the consuming fire, they didn't want the Holy One of Israel. So they're talking to Isaiah and to other true prophets saying, Stop doing this, stop it. Stop talking to me about God's holiness. Stop talking to me about God as the consuming fire. I don't wanna hear it anymore. Stop it. Leave this way, get off this path. Stop preaching like that. Tell us pleasant things. Funny or happy things. Lie to me. Just make me happy. It's the regular tragic history of the Jewish nation as recorded in Scripture. Stephen nailed them for it in Acts seven, "You stiff-necked people," he said to the Sanhedrin, "With uncircumcised hearts and ears! You're just like your fathers: You always resist the Holy Spirit. Was there ever a prophet your fathers did not persecute?" Is there even one? Jesus said the same thing, "You build tombs for the prophets and decorate the graves of the righteous, and you say, “If we had lived in the days of our forefathers, we wouldn't have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.”" But Jesus said, ‘So you testify against yourselves that you're the descendants of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up then the measure of the sins of your forefathers, go ahead and do it, kill me,’ which they did.

This is a tragic thing. Again and again, think of the examples, think of wicked king Ahab. Remember that, when he's gonna go out to fight Ramoth-Gilead, and he's got godly king Jehoshaphat next to him, remember? And they got all these false prophets saying, ‘Go and succeed, you're going to win. It's gonna be awesome.’ I don't think they said awesome, but anyway, ‘You're just gonna be great. You're gonna be victorious.’ And Jehoshaphat with that sensitivity from the Lord, he's like, ‘Isn't there a prophet of the Lord that we could inquire of? I don't care if you've got 5000 of these guys, they're worthless. Are there any prophets of the Lord?’ Do you remember what Ahab said? ‘Well, there is one, but I hate him, because he always says bad things about me.’ [chuckle] Well, I think you might wanna listen, King Ahab to Micaiah, son of Imlah. Remember Jehoshaphat said, ‘The king should not say that.’ I don't know how he said that, but that's what he said. Or in Jeremiah's day, they wanted “priests and prophets alike. To treat the wound of the people as though were not serious. To say ‘Peace, peace,’ when there is no peace.” That's what they wanted. But then when Jeremiah told the truth, they put him in a miry pit, they put him in prison. And Jonathan, in the secretary's house, they put him in prison, they persecute him. And so, Paul gave a clear warning about all this, this phenomenon here in verses 10-11. He says in 2 Timothy 4:3-4, "For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a large number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths." 

So, the fundamental test of a true prophet of God then and a true teacher, pastor, teacher, now is the willingness to bring the whole counsel of God's word, no matter what the people think, no matter what the people say, to tell the truth. This was the little boy, Samuel's test, that he had to go tell Eli that his house was going to be destroyed because of his sin. Every pastor faces the pressure of shaping his message to suit the taste of the people. Everyone does. Every proclaimer of God's word has to make this fundamental choice that Paul talks about in Galatians 1:10, "Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ." Flannery O'Connor put it this way, "The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it." So we're not going to change it based on whether it's palatable, or as Paul said later in Galatians 4:16, "Have I now become your enemy by telling you the truth?" But apparently, back in Isaiah's day, that's exactly how it was. He became their enemy by telling the truth.

So what pleasant things did the people want to hear? Well, the 21st century version would be, ‘I'm okay, you're okay. The future is bright, God's happy with us. Everything's just how it should be. Let's eat.’ Something like that. Or, ‘It's not time to eat yet, I'll tell you some fun stories, I'll entertain you until the time's up.’ This will make them very popular with their hearers. But Jesus said, "Woe to you when all men speak well of you, for that's how they spoke of the false prophets." I meditate on that. It's like, what is it about these guys that everyone likes what they say, because they say things that everyone likes? Moralistic diatribe, fun stories, different things that we could all agree on. But they stay away from those things that confront people with the Holy One of Israel, put it that way. Well, in verses 12-14, the future for this people who turn away is dark indeed. “Therefore,” do you see the word therefore in verse 12, because you want the tickling ears, because you don't want to be confronted with the Holy One of Israel, I love what it says, ‘Stop confronting us with the Holy One of Israel. Therefore, this is what the Holy One of Israel says.’ In other words, he's not going away. [chuckle] This is his universe. We're in his living room, he's not going anywhere. So, “Therefore, this is what the Holy One of Israel says: “Because you have rejected this message, and relied on oppression and depended on deceit, this sin will become for you like a high wall, cracked and bulging, that collapses suddenly, in an instant. It will break in pieces like pottery, shattered so mercilessly that among its pieces, not a fragment will be found for taking coals from a hearth or scooping water out of a cistern." So they're telling lies, they see a seer is coming, they need a wall of protection, right? So they build up a wall of lies, and he says ‘It's poor construction, don't you see it's leaning over, the mortar isn't setting. There's cracks in it. It's coming down. I wouldn't stand under this wall if I were you, 'cause it's coming down.’ 

Reminds me of when we want to visit Haiti after the earthquake, and we saw a school that had been condemned and the construction there would not have been accepted in the US, there was no rebar, there were some other things, and it was just dangerous. And so, there are already broken pieces of cinder block all over the place, but many of it hadn't fallen yet, and they just condemned it, 'cause they can see what's gonna happen. And that's what Isaiah's saying here, it's the same thing, this bulging wall of lies, and it's just gonna come down on your head. It's going to destroy you.

But here we come in verse 15 to the text I've already read, God's beautiful, central invitation stands. This is our hope. This is the joy. "This is what the Sovereign Lord, the Holy One of Israel says, 'In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength.'" So God speaks, this Holy One of Israel, speaks a word of grace, he speaks a word of blessing to us, the word of counsel. "In repentance and rest, in quietness and trust," that's where your salvation is. Repentance is literally turning in: turning away from your sins, and rest means don't venture forth on some path God didn't tell you to go on. Stay here, stay put under the mighty hand of God. Submit yourself unto God's mighty hand, rest under his hand, rest under it. In quietness is: be at peace under God's hand. The opposite I think of impatience is quietness based on faith, you're quiet under God's plan, trusting Him to work it out. And your heart is not murmuring, you're quiet. So quietness, and you're accepting what's happening as the sovereign will of God. And then ultimately, as always, trust faith, ultimately it's faith. Trust in me, believe in me, and I will save you. He says it again and again, By faith alone, “The righteous will live by faith," Habakkuk 2:4, it's what he gives them. It's his timeless counsel, repentance, rest, quietness and trust.

But look at the people's reaction, "But you would have none of it." It's just the pain, the pathos of that statement. ‘I told you what to do, but look what you're saying to me, but you would have none of it. You said no.’ Do you see that word right in the text, ‘You said no.’ Who are they saying no to? To God who said in repentance, rest, quietness and trust. They said, no, not that. We have a better plan. We have a better plan. We're gonna flee on horses, we got some good horses. God says ‘Fine, I'll give your enemies better horses.’ ‘Oh, we're gonna be swift, we're gonna ride swift,’ ‘Therefore your pursuers will be swift, 'cause they're not your issue, I am.’ I mean, do you feel the tragedy of that? God told them repentance, rest quietness, and trust. And they said, ‘No, no, I don't want it.’ 

And so, this section makes plain the key issue, how people respond to the word of God spoken by the prophets. They rejected the words of warning and judgment and woe. They rejected those words, they wanted pleasant things, they wanted illusions, they wanted sweet, happy things. They didn't wanna hear any more about the Holy One of Israel. And so, judgment is going to come on them. God told them that repentance and rest, quietness and trust would be their salvation, but they said, ‘No, they're going to run.’ God said, ‘Okay, then you're going to run.’ And in the end, the end result will be total desolation, there'll be no and left. Now, that didn't get fulfilled with Assyria, that got fulfilled with Babylon over a century later, when Lamentations begins with these words, “How desolate lies the city once so filled with people.” 

Well, aren't you glad the chapter doesn't end there? Aren't you glad that there's words of grace, there's words of forgiveness and mercy? And so, in verses 18-26 God gives transforming grace to those who will simply wait on the Lord. Verse 18, "Yet the Lord waits to be gracious to you; he exalts himself to show you compassion. For the Lord is a God of justice. Blessed are all who wait for him!" So God is waiting for us so that we will wait for him. And the wheels of redemptive history are turning, God's providential sovereign controller is turning, and his plan is unfolding and he's waiting for it to all happen. And he's waiting, so he can show us compassion. And he exalts himself, he makes much of himself through the miracles of Jesus and through the preaching of the apostles and of the church for 20 centuries, and all of God's mighty works, he exalts himself so that he can show you compassion, isn't that incredible? So that you'll call in the name of the Lord and be saved, “For the Lord is a God of justice.” Huh. Justice that produces salvation. How can those be put together? Well, you know, what's the answer? How do justice and our salvation come together in the cross of Jesus Christ? That's how it all comes together. We'll get to in a minute, but justice, God is a God of justice and he will do what is right, and he longs to show you compassion. So, I have a blessing to give you, blessed are all you people who wait on him. Salvation comes to those who wait on the Lord, God will give us grace. And he's gonna work it step by step, verse 19, God works in his people to cry out to the Lord, “For a people shall dwell in Zion, in Jerusalem; you shall weep no more. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry, As soon as he hears you, he will answer you,” “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." Cry out to me, he's gonna work a change in their hearts, they're not going down to Egypt with gold anymore, they're done with that, they're done with the side shows, and they realize now they are getting what they deserve for their sins. They have turned away from their sins and wickedness. They've turned away from that and they have turned in faith, in quietness, in trust to God, and they are now crying out to God, ‘Oh God, would you deliver us? Save us.’ 

Secondly, God transforms the hearts of his people to heed his word, to listen to his counsel. Verses 20-21, "Although the Lord gives you the bread of adversity and the waters of affliction," it's one of the strangest meals that God feeds his people. You go overseas, go on the mission field, you're gonna eat some strange food. Remember Elizabeth Elliot said, "Where he leads, I will follow, what he feeds, I will swallow." [laughter] And she ate some strange things in the jungles of Ecuador, very strange foods. This is the strangest, why would God feed his own beloved children the bread of adversity and the waters of affliction? Because He's sanctifying you, and He's saying, ‘Here, eat this.’ And you say, ‘Yes, Lord,’ and you eat it. You eat it because it's good for you, even though it's bitter in your mouth, it's good for you, and you patiently chew it and you swallow every bit of it until God is done showing you adversity and affliction. You wait, wait under his mighty hand. Wait under the affliction, wait under the pain, wait under the unknowing of what's gonna happen. Just wait under him and let him guide you. Says, “Your teachers will be hidden no more; with your own eyes you will see them. Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, 'This is the way; walk in it.'" That of course, is ultimately fulfilled in the indwelling Holy Spirit, isn't it? The spirit of truth, who will live with you and be in you, and he will guide you, it says, into all truth. 

‘So he will direct you to turn neither to the right nor to the left,’ that's Deuteronomy language of complete obedience to the law. "So be careful," Deuteronomy 5:32-33, "So be careful to do what the Lord your God has commanded you; Do not turn aside to the right or to the left. Walk in all the way that the Lord your God has commanded you, so that you may live and prosper and prolong your days in the land that you will possess.” Now, your ears will hear a voice behind you, and God will transform you and you will walk in that straight and narrow way, and turn neither to the right nor to the left. God will transform also the hearts of the people to despise their idols that caused all the trouble and throw them away. Hate them. Genuinely hate those idols. Verse 22, "Then you will defile your idols overlaid with silver and your images covered with gold; you'll throw them away like a menstrual cloth and say to them, 'Away with you!'" What you used to love, you now hate 'cause God hates it, and you throw it away.

It's transformation, complete transformation. And then God pours out transformation on the whole land, though it was cursed, it was under the curse of Deuteronomy and the curse of the law of Moses, it had become like a desert. It's going to flourish. And the curse will be removed. Verse 23-26, "He will send you also rain for the seed you sow on the ground, and the food that comes from the land will be rich and plentiful. And in that day your cattle will graze in broad meadows, and the oxen and donkeys at work the soil will eat fodder and mash, spread out with fork and shovel. In the day of great slaughter, when the towers fall, streams of water will flow on every high mountain and every lofty hill. The moon will shine like the sun, and the sunlight would be seven times brighter like the light of seven full days, when the Lord binds up the bruises of his people and heals the wounds he inflicted." It's the land flowing with milk and honey again. And better than ever before, brighter than it ever was before, shining like the light of seven full days. Oh, how beautiful is that?

Final section of Isaiah 30 is God's wrath against his enemies. Says ‘You don't need Egypt, you need me. [chuckle] I can take care of Assyria, I can crush Assyria in ways that you will never forget.’ These are terrifying verses dear friends, terrifying. But listen to them, verses 27 and following, "Behold the name of the Lord comes from afar, with burning anger and dense clouds of smoke; his lips are full of wrath, and his tongue is a consuming fire. His breath is like a rushing torrent, rising up to the neck. He shakes the nations in the sieve of destruction; he places in the jaws of the people a bit that leads them astray. And you will sing as on the night you celebrate a holy festival; your hearts will rejoice as when people go up with flutes to the mountain of the Lord, to the Rock of Israel. The Lord will cause men to hear his majestic voice and will make them see his arm coming down with raging fire, with raging anger and consuming fire, with cloudbursts, and thunderstorm and hail. And the voice of the Lord will shatter Assyria; with his scepter, he will strike them down. And every stroke the Lord lays on them with his punishing rod will be to the music of tambourines and harps. As he fights them in battle with the blows of his arm." Verse 33, "Topheth has long been prepared; it has been made ready for the king. Its fire pit has been made deep and wide, with an abundance of fire and wood; the breath of the Lord, like a stream of burning sulfur, sets it ablaze."

Final act of this drama in Isaiah 30 is the wrath of the Lord poured out on his enemies. The Assyrians are mere mortals, you don't need Egypt, you need God. God can handle them easily. And the images of wrath here are powerful, God's name comes from afar. God is zealous for his namesake. He's gonna move out powerfully to defend his name, he's gonna come with burning anger and dense clouds of smoke with raging torrents of fire. A lot of the anthropomorphic images here of God having body parts is powerful, his lips filled with wrath, his tongue, a consuming fire, his breath like a rushing flood, drowning all his enemies. It's by the mouth of the Lord. You see it? By how he speaks, he speaks, and they are judged. It's that simple. And he does it to the nations that are against him, puts them in a sieve of destruction, and leads them by the jaw where he wants them to go. The Assyrian army will be destroyed instantly, and we'll talk about that in Isaiah 37. The people of God will celebrate wildly as they are delivered and God gets the glory. And Topheth, a place where they burned garbage outside of Jerusalem, New Testament version is Gehenna, is a picture of hell. A picture where all of this wreckage of the nations is gathered and it's burning with sulfur coming from the mouth of the Lord forever and ever.

So, how does Isaiah 30 preach the gospel of Jesus? Well, I already hinted at it, couldn't hold back. Only in the cross of Christ are justice and grace coming together, only in the cross of Christ does God deliver sinners like us from his wrath with grace and mercy and compassion. Jesus, the Son of God, came into this world to be our sin bearer. He came to stand under Topheth for us, to take the stream of burning sulfur into himself and absorb it completely, so that we would not suffer in hell forever and ever, that's what Jesus came to do. 

And in the double exchange of the Gospel, that he came to take our wickedness on himself and extinguished the wrath of God forever, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” And to give you his perfect righteousness and to restore you beautifully, like these verses say, and to pour out grace and to give you a heart of supplication, so you cry out against your idols and throw them away, 'cause you hate them and you yearn for righteousness and you hunger and thirst for it, 'cause you have a new nature now, and you yearn to walk in the straight and narrow, not turning aside to the right or left, and you now have the indwelling Holy Spirit, and the Spirit tells you where to go. In conjunction with his written word and not separate from it, please don't misunderstand, and do not elevate that voice inside you telling you where to go to the word of God. Test everything you hear in your heart by the word. But the Holy Spirit leads us and guides us, 'cause he is the spirit of truth. And how beautiful is that? 

And so, final word for you is the same faith that saves your soul, will also teach you how to get through the trials God has planned for you. He's going to throw some boulders in your highway. He's going to put a mudslide across your path. Don't cut and run, don't give up, and don't go four-wheeling, don't pull off on the shoulder and go over someone's lawn. Wait under God's mighty hand, and in due time, he will lift you up.

Now we're coming to a time of the Lord's Supper, it's a time for us to prepare ourselves. If God has spoken to you today, if you're convicted of your sins, go to him in grace. If you've never trusted in Christ as your Lord and Savior, you came here to hear the Gospel, you just heard it. All you have to do is believe in Jesus, trust in him. Don't come and take from the Lord's Supper. This is for people who have already testified to their faith in Jesus by water baptism, so if that's you, please come. But if you trusted in Christ, been baptized, but you know you're a sinner, it's for sinners. Jesus shed his blood for sinners like you and me, so come. And it's also for us as the family of God to draw together around the table and love each other and realize we're going to heaven together because of the grace of God. 

Let's close in prayer. Father, thank you for the word of Isaiah. Thank you for this sermon, thank you for what Isaiah 30 tells us about the power of God to deliver us from the true danger that faces us, not the Assyrians, but your own justice and wrath expressed on Judgment Day and in hell, you've come to deliver us if we'll just listen to you, tell us the truth, we will turn away from our sins in repentance and turning and rest and trust is our salvation. Thank you for this message, in Jesus name, Amen.

Pastor Andy Davis preaches a verse-by-verse expository sermon on Isaiah 29:1-24. The main subject is the great power God uses to sanctify us and cure us of spiritual hypocrisy.

 God is here right now, by the power of his Holy Spirit, he is seeking out those who will give him true worship, those who will worship him in spirit and truth, he is seeking us so that we will seek him, and God is seeking our hearts. The Bible says in Psalm 139, "I praise you, O Lord, because I am fearfully and wonderfully made." There is no part of us more fearfully and wonderfully made, more complex than that part of us, the Scripture calls our heart, our heart. What is the heart? The Bible says that it's the part of us that thinks and reasons and analyzes and studies, the heart does that, part of us that understands. But it's also the part of us that loves and hates what it understands. Love should love righteousness and hate wickedness, but it's our heart that does that, it's the part of us that delights and makes plans and has emotions, and that makes choices, that's the heart. There is nothing in the human existence more complex than that, and according to the Scripture, that's what God desires. He wants our hearts. He is seeking the heart, God seeks the heart.

God searches the heart, God studies the heart. Naturally in Adam, our hearts are, as Jeremiah put it, desperately wicked beyond comprehension, we cannot understand our own hearts, we don't understand why we do what we do, as Paul said in Romans 7, our hearts are complicated. And apart from Christ, naturally, desperately wicked, but in Christ, supernaturally transformed. Praise God for that. There is no hope for us other than that, the transforming work of Christ, radically transformed and yet still a battlefield. Do you feel it? Do you feel the assaults of the evil one on your heart? Have you felt it this week? I have. And what are the weapons of the devil: the idolatry of this world, going after your heart trying to lure it away. As it says in Hebrews 3, "See to it, brothers, that none of you has a sinful unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. But encourage one another daily as long as it is called “Today,” so that none of you may be hardened by sin's deceitfulness." The deceitfulness of sin hardens our hearts. That's the battle. So those are Satan's weapons, the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, the boastful pride of life, that's the assault every day, every hour on your heart.

But what are God's weapons? Oh, they are mighty. How about just the truth? The greatness of God. The greatness of God. He is a mighty God, he doesn't have to hide, he doesn't need any deceptions about himself, he doesn’t need any salesman to shade the truth a bit. He is great, he is magnificent. The truth is on God's side, not just about himself, but about Christ, his only begotten Son, who was sent into the world for sinners like you and me. The truth is very attractive if we can just see it, and so he has the truth on his side and he also has the power of the Spirit, he has free access to your heart, he can do whatever he wants to your heart, he can take out that heart of stone and he can give you that heart of flesh any time he pleases. And he doesn't have to ask your permission to do it. And he has sovereign power through the Spirit to transform us, those are God's weapons, and God will win in the end. But there's a battle going on for the hearts.

Now, this morning, it just so happens. You don't believe in luck, do you? I sure don't. It just so happened in the ordinary course of preaching, I get to preach this morning, on one of the two most important corrective texts there are in the Bible on worship. Marvelous. Now, this one comes at us negatively, it comes at us convictingly, searchingly, it's verse 13, right in the middle, "These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me." This text has been for me a mirror, or perhaps even a surgeon's scalpel probing my own heart this week. It's worked on me, it's done it's work on me. And I was saying to a number of people this morning, it's been a very, very pleasing pain for me this week, it's been painful, but pleasing. It's an odd combination, you might think, how do pleasure and pain go together? Well, this is how it works, it's pain because it's showing me the weaknesses and the deficiencies of my own heart. The text has been true of me often times this week and regularly in my Christian life, that I honor God with my lips, with my external, but my heart is far from him. And it's hard to hear that, isn't it? Painful. To have God say that to me and for me to recognize it's true, actually. That's painful.

Why is it pleasing? Well, thank God I feel the pain. You know what that means? I'm alive, and if I'm alive, I will never die. I've crossed over from death to life. What it means is, wherever I fall short, that's going to be changed, I'm going to be healed. Someday with a united heart, I will praise God perfectly, forever. So it's been a pleasing pain for me.

I wish it weren't true ever of me, verse 13, but it is sometimes true. You may ask, ‘What's the other text?’ It's the parallel text kind of mirror image text in John chapter 4, where Jesus speaks to the Samaritan woman, remember how she tried to change the subject off of her sin, remember that? To worship and she went, just where Jesus wanted her to go anyway. Let's talk about worship, believe me, woman, “The time is coming and has now come when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshippers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.”

Frankly, I think that Isaiah 29:13 and John 4:23-24 are teaching the same thing. One of them negatively, one of them positively. Negatively, God doesn't want our hearts to be distant from him while we worship. Positively, we should be passionately engaged with our spirits, passionately engaged in the truth. So it's teaching the same thing, two sides of the same coin. Now, Isaiah 29 as a whole, the whole chapter, Nathan read just part of it, the whole chapter is about how God is willing to do and really must do heart surgery on his people to transform them. He's willing to do heart surgery, in fact, he must do heart surgery on us, the surgery must come from the outside-in because we cannot operate on ourselves, God must do this work in us. And big picture, the message of Isaiah 29 as a whole in redemptive history, as we see, is that God is willing to hurt his people in order to heal them.

And as I was thinking about it and talked to doctors, dentists, about the medical procedures, therapies, there are in this world, it's amazing how many of them, maybe most of them, hurt the body in order to heal it. Think about it. Every surgery does. Isn’t that true? We are willing to have a wound made so that the tumor can be removed. Every surgery does it. I'm thinking every time a bone is set, it's a necessary pain in order to bring about healing. Every time there's a gash in the skin and some stitches are done, additional wounds made to the body so that the gap can be pulled together and there can be healing. Chemotherapy, radiation does acceptable damage to perfectly good tissue so that the cancer can be killed, and body healed. I was talking to Jim Eaker at the Turkey Bowl yesterday, he said, "Dental work, he's always going through perfectly good enamel to get to the rottenness." So it is here, God is willing to, and I say he must hurt us in order to heal us, he must.

 Now, in this chapter, it's all about a siege that comes to a city, he's bringing a siege to Jerusalem, he's gonna do it, but the reasons for it are in the middle of the chapter, it's because of what's going on inside their hearts, and God is willing to hurt his people in order to transform them and heal them, and by the end of the chapter, there's just nothing but good news, nothing but the transformation that God has worked. So though it's a difficult chapter and a difficult journey, how marvelous is it to see God's truth speak to us even today?

So let's start at the beginning, verses 1-8, we see God humbling his own people down to the very dust, verses 1-4, and then in verses 5-8, crushing his enemies to the very dust, so God does some different kind of work there, it's different with his people than it is with his enemies. So look at verses 1-4, God humbles complacent Jerusalem down to the very dust by a siege, so you look at verse 1-4, "Woe to you Ariel, Ariel, the city where David settled! Add year to year and let your cycle of festivals go on. Yet I will besiege Ariel; she will mourn and lament, she will be to me like an altar hearth. I will encamp against you all around; I will encircle you with towers I will set up my siege works against you. Brought low, you will speak from the ground; your speech will mumble out of the dust. Your voice will come ghost-like from the earth out of the dust; your speech will whisper."

Well, what's Ariel, you may ask. Well, it's the city where David settled, so it's pretty obvious we're talking about Jerusalem. Ariel means altar hearth, most scholars tell us so, it's a place of an altar where burning sacrifices go up in worship to God. So the issue of this chapter is the religiosity of the people, they're just in this religious machine and it's just turning like a machine, they're adding year to year, and the cycle of festivals is just going on endlessly. It’s just going on, and he says almost sarcastically, go ahead, keep going, just add year to year, and let the cycle of festival just keep on going, but I'm going to besiege you and I'm gonna crush you.

So they were into their religion, and Isaiah's already dealt with this at the beginning of the book, in Isaiah 1:11-14, God says to the people who are just, they're just cranking it out in terms of religion, they're just cranking it out week after week, year after year, they're just cranking it out, they're bringing animal sacrifices to God again and again and again. In Isaiah 1, he says, "The multitude of your sacrifices—what are they to me?” What are they to me, “Says the Lord. “I have more than enough of burnt offerings of rams and of the fat of fattened animals; I have no pleasure in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats. When you come to appear before me, who asked this of you, this trampling of my courts? Stop bringing meaningless offerings! Your incense is detestable to me. New Moon, Sabbath, convocations—I cannot bear your evil assemblies. Your New Moon festivals and your appointed feast, my soul hates. They have become a burden to me; and I'm weary of bearing them.” That's Isaiah 1.

 It says the same thing basically in this chapter, they're just cranking it out, the religion, you know what I'm saying? The religion, the outward forms week after week after week. Doing what they think God told them to do, and God did tell them to do it, but that's not the point. Point is they're just, it's the outward show. And along with this machinery came a religious complacency, a false confidence, trusting in their pure, heaven-sent religion, they thought God would never destroy them. They're safe, they're safe, it didn't matter how they lived, it didn't matter what's going on in their hearts, they're safe. And they assumed that God would never let anyone else come and stop it. Years later, Jeremiah would find the same thing, that people were saying the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, three times stated. It's like, well, it's a talisman, it's a religious good luck charm. Because we have a temple, God's never gonna let the city get destroyed. Watch what I do to my temple. That's what Jeremiah got to say a century later. But the same thing's going on here. This religious complacency. So therefore, God predicts judgments. Look at verse 2-3, "I will besiege, Ariel;” Jerusalem, “I'll besiege it, she'll mourn in lament, she will be to me like an altar hearth." So there'll be fire, but not the kind of fire you're used to. A different kind of fire. I will encamp against you all around. I will encircle you with towers and set up my siege works against you.

And the people of God, Jerusalem, is gonna be humbled down to the very dust, they're going to be brought low, right down to the dust, and they'll barely be able to speak, their spirit will be so weak, so crushed by this action of God. Notice he says, "I will besiege you," I'm the issue, I'm the one doing it. I will besiege you and I'm gonna bring you down. I'm gonna bring you to the dust, and you'll barely be able to whisper out any kind of prayer or anything at all, you'll be that weak. Verse 1-4, but then interestingly, verses 5-8, God turns and says, I'm gonna bring actually your besieger down to the dust too. I'm gonna crush him and it's gonna happen suddenly, I'm gonna turn just like that, and it's gonna happen suddenly. Look at verses 5-8, "But your many enemies will become like fine dust," so there's that word dust again, they're gonna be humbled to the dust too. "The ruthless hordes will be like blown chaff. Suddenly in an instant, the Lord Almighty will come, will come with thunder and earthquake and great noise, with windstorm and tempest and flames of a devouring fire. Then the hordes of all the nations fight against Ariel, that attack her and her fortresses and besiege her, all of those besieging forces will be like it is with a dream, with a vision in the night—as when a hungry man dreams that he's eating, but he awakens, and his hunger remains; or as when a thirsty man dreams that he's drinking, but he awakens faint, with his thirst unquenched, so it will be with the hordes of all the nations that fight against Mount Zion.”

So the hoards here are unnamed, but we have to think in context, he's talking about Assyria, that's coming soon. They're going to attack and besiege Jerusalem, they're gonna come against it, and they're going to make incredible progress, Isaiah's already been playing about this, they're going to conquer every city in Judah, but one. A lot of people will die, a lot of people will die, many will flee to the city of the walled fortress of Jerusalem, they'll flee there, but they're gonna die there too, from famine and all that. It's gonna be a time of great suffering. So it looks really bad. Assyria undefeated, powerful, dreaming of conquest, dreaming of plunder, dreaming of crushing the people of YHWH, that's what they're dreaming about, and they're gonna come, but then suddenly everything turns like in an instant. Do you see that right in the text? Suddenly in an instant, everything changes, so it's an instantaneous appearance of Almighty God with power like a storm.

Well, if you know the history, you know exactly what this is talking about. Assyria was there, they're in place. They're gonna win. No doubt about it. And God sends out that angel 185,000 Assyrian troops died in one night. And it's amazing how the text reads there in Isaiah 37:36, "When the people awoke the next morning," it's gotta do with waking up and looking around, it's exactly what we have here in this chapter. He awakens and his dream is unfulfilled, he cannot have what he thought he was gonna get, because his soldiers are all dead.

Now, it's amazing throughout history how many times the enemies of the people of God have licked their chops at the imminent demise of the people of God. Assuming that they would all be destroyed, that they would be gone, excited for the death of this eminent leader, let's say of the Christian church or of Christianity itself. I think about in Acts 23, when Paul's enemies were so committed to his destruction that they took an oath not to eat or drink ever again until they had assassinated Paul. Remember that one? I think they got real thin or they gave up the oath. Because a little nephew somewhere gets wind of it, tells the Roman commander and he gets hundreds of soldiers and they move Paul quickly that night from Jerusalem to Caesarea. So much for that. So they had a dream, they thought it was gonna happen, and they wake and faint, and they didn't get what they wanted.

When you think about other enemies of the people of God, think about Voltaire during the Enlightenment, making predictions that the Bible is gonna go on the ash heap of forgotten literature. Well, I haven't forgotten the Bible. I think it's fantastic. What do you guys think? I bet you more people today know the Bible than Voltaire. What do you think? I'm thinking so.

Or just think about the Communist leaders of the 20th century who predicted the destruction of Christianity, thought that Christianity would grow weaker and weaker. It's the opiate of the people and all that kind of thing, remember? Or how about this? How about a rock star, 1966, John Lennon of the Beatles made a famous statement, he said this, "Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I need not argue with that; I am right and I will be proved right. We're more popular than Jesus now." Now, some of you, I may need to tell who the Beatles are. So much for that, John Lennon. Christianity is not gonna go, Christianity is gonna go on and on and on forever. The enemies who lick their chops thinking that it's going to sometime disappear, it is not going to disappear, it's just gonna keep getting stronger. How many people do you think have been brought into the kingdom of Christ since John Lennon made that statement in 1966? Tens of millions. So the dream of God's people vanishing into nothingness itself will vanish into nothingness.

Now, in verses 9-16, Isaiah gets into the reason why God is bringing this judgment on his people. There's a reason, there are reasons why God has to work, why he has to do heart surgery. What is the nature of this disease? We're gonna find three aspects to it.

First, cause number one for this judgment that's coming, is willful spiritual blindness, verses 9-12. It says, "They'll be stunned and amazed, blind yourselves and be sightless; be drunk, but not from wine, stagger, but not from beer." That's talking about the reaction to the coming invasion, they're going to be like drunk people, they don't know what to do, they don't know where to go with their bodies, they're gonna stagger back with the news. Verse 10, "The Lord has brought over you a deep sleep: He has sealed your eyes (the prophets); He has covered your heads, (the seers). For you, this whole vision is nothing but words sealed in a scroll, and if you give the scroll to someone who can read and say to him, read this, please, he will answer, ‘I can't; It's sealed. Or if you give the scroll to someone who cannot read and say, 'Read this, please,' he will answer, 'I don't know how to read.'" The scroll represents the Word of God, it represents the word of the true prophets of God. The people who could understand it, the prophets, the seers, and all that, that could understand that, can't make anything out of it. It's like it's sealed. They can't get to it. They should know better, they should know what God is doing. They should be able to read God's Word and understand it, but it's a sealed scroll to them. And then there are others who just don't have the ability to comprehend it, it's like they can't read. It represents willful spiritual blindness, in reference to the Word of God, in reference to the Scripture. That's cause number one.

Cause number two, in verses 13 and 14, especially verse 13, "The Lord says: "These people come near to me with their mouth, and they honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship of me is made up only of rules taught by men. Therefore, once more I will astound these people with wonder upon wonder, the wisdom of the wise will perish, the intelligence of the intelligent will vanish." So the Lord is judging his people because of their distant hearts. The externals are in place, they're doing the religion that they received from Moses, the laws of Moses. They're adding the cycle of festivals year after year, they're doing the animal sacrifices, but their hearts are far from God. They're hypocrites, religious hypocrites. In Isaiah 58:2, he says this, "For day after day, they seek me out, they seem eager to know my ways as if they were a nation that does what is right and has not forsaken the commands of its God. They ask me for just decisions and they seem eager for God to come near them." But they're not. And so they have the outside show, and they say the right things, but they're living corruptly from inside their hearts. Jeremiah will say to his generation dealing with the exact same issue in Jeremiah 3:4-5, he says, "Have you not just called to me, 'My father, my friend from my youth? Will you always be angry? Oh Father, will your wrath continue forever?' This is how you talk, but you do all the evil you can.”

So they honor God with their lips, but their hearts are far from him. What does that mean? What does that mean their hearts were far from God? Well, the Lord weighs the inner person, he weighs your heart, he knows what you think about, he knows what you love and what you hate, what you're attracted to, what you're repulsed from, God is not at all interested in religious formalism, in a machinery of religion. In Jesus's day, the Pharisees and scribes, the teachers of the law, were the quintessential examples of this hypocrisy. They were experts in religion, experts in matters of the law, experts in tithing; mint, and dill, and cumin, experts in religiosity, but their hearts were dead toward God. They looked beautiful on the outside, but inside, they were full of dead men's bones and everything unclean, Jesus said. They were actually idolaters who were living for the trappings of power and the praise of people who loved to be greeted in the marketplaces and have people call them Rabbi, who for a pretense made extended prayer so that people would honor how religious they were, but secretly plotting to devour widows homes, and so they're living for earthly things despite all their religious trappings, so they love the stuff of this world, just like always. Power and pleasure and money and all that stuff, that's what they're living for.

And so Jesus reaches for this exact verse in Isaiah 29, to describe them, he said when they came to him to criticize him about not doing the ceremonial washings that the elders had said they were supposed to do. He said, you hypocrites, you hypocrites, you actors, you external ones. Who look so good on the outside, but I know the heart, “You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you. These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are just rules taught by men.”

Now, during the First Great Awakening, Jonathan Edwards was facing some people just like that; religious experts who are against what God was doing through the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, just incredible. An incredible work of God, a work of revival. People's hearts were being transformed, they were being moved out of churchianity, dead religion, they were being brought to a living, vital relationship with God, and God was using many different servants to do it. George Whitefield, probably the greatest, but he used Edwards and others too. And they were preaching the new birth and a transformation from within. But the old lights, they were called, there wasn't any light there, but anyway, the old lights were trying to shut it down, trying to shut down the revival, and there were some pretty bad excesses going on, that happens during revival, some things that shouldn't have happened. Went too far. And so Jonathan Edwards, who is the ultimate scientist of spirituality, the guy was amazingly accurate in his careful assessment, looking at what was the real deal in the work of God, and he wrote this masterpiece, A Treatise on Religious Affections, to say, fundamentally, the issue of true religion is from the heart. It's heart affections. What did he mean? Well, he said, the heart has the ability to analyze and assess everything, that's the intellectual side, plus have affections toward it and be attracted to it or repulsed from it, to a great or less degree, depending on what it is. That's what the heart does. And this is what Edwards wrote in that masterpiece, "If we are not in good earnest in religion, if our wills and our inclinations are not strongly exercised, we are nothing. The things of religion are so great, the responses of our hearts cannot be proportional unless those responses be lively and powerful. In nothing is vigor in the actings of our inclinations, so appropriate as in religion, conversely, in nothing is lukewarmness so odious. True religion is ever more a powerful thing; and its power appears primarily in its inward exercises in the heart it's principle and original seat." Edwards is saying, bring it. Bring your passions. And don't be lukewarm when it comes to worship. “God is spirit, and his worshippers must worship in Spirit and in truth.” That means mentally understand right doctrine, get it right, get it accurately, and then just praise God for it. Let your heart be elevated out of its stupor and its deadness.

Alright, well, that's what it means, these people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me? They knew the right stuff, but their hearts were cold and dead toward it, they had no concern for it, therefore, verse 14, "Therefore, I will once more astound these people with wonder upon wonder." Let's just keep it literalistic: I'll do two wonders. [chuckle] Wonder upon wonder. The wisdom of the wise will perish, the intelligence of the intelligent will vanish. Alright, well, I don't know for sure that he was having in mind two wonders precisely, but how about the wonder of bringing the Assyrians and then the wonder of killing them and sending the rest away? I'm going to astound them therefore, therefore, because of the deadness of the heart, my remedy is radical heart surgery, I'm gonna bring the Assyrians, and the pressure that they will bring to bear will change the hearts of my people. I'm gonna bring this horror to them, and then I'm gonna take it away and they will be healed.

And so he talks about their worldly wisdom, the wisdom of the wise, I'm gonna frustrate the intelligence of the intelligent. And then in verse 15 and 16, he talks about this, the secret plans that people make and how what a joke, what a joke about that, “Woe to those who go to great depths to hide their plans from the Lord.” Don't bother, make no effort to hide anything from God, there's no point. Who do their work in darkness and think who sees us? Who will know? “You turn things upside down as if the potter were thought to be like the clay. Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, ‘He did not make me?’ Can the pot say of the potter, "He knows nothing?"” Well, I think there're two issues going on here with this hidden dark secret thing, simply in context, it may be talking about just the plans that they're making to form an alliance with Egypt to stave off the invasion of the Assyrians. He talks about it in the next two chapters. Again and again, chapter 30, ““Woe to the obstinate children,” declares the Lord, “to those who carry out plans.”" There's that word plan, "Carries out plans that are not mine, forming an alliance, but not by my Spirit, heaping sin upon sin; to those who go down to Egypt without consulting me; who look for help to Pharaoh's protection and to Egypt shade for refuge.” But they don't look to me. So I think in context, that's one answer.

But let's go deeper, please, because if you don't find delight in God, you're going to find it in some idols, just the way it is. You're not gonna say ‘I'll just be pleasureless in life, I'll just abstain from pleasure the rest of my life. I don't care about pleasure, I don't want to be happy.’ No, no, you have a relentless drive to be happy, and if you're not going to find it in God, you'll find it in some created thing or things, you just will. And some of them are gonna be shameful, frankly, and in competition against God, all of them are shameful, even if they're themselves good things. He says to those who do this, who have these secrets in darkness, he says, you're perverse. You're turning things upside down. Don't you know who I am? He who formed the eye, does he not see? He who formed the ear, does he not hear? You think I don't know what you're doing? I am the issue. Not the audience that you're trying to hide it from, I'm the issue. Clear out the idolatry and you will be able to worship me passionately from the heart. You're the clay, I'm the potter. Don't turn things upside down, let me shape you, let me change you, let me heal you. And you'll be able to worship me.

And so, good news. Verses 17-24 end really happy. Aren't you glad the chapter ends happy? I like happy, I'm big on happy. And it ends happy, so beautiful, verse after verse of God transforming his people from all effects of sin, amazing promises. Verse 17, the strip forests of Lebanon are going to be returned to being a fertile field. Verse 18, the spiritually deaf and blind will be able at last to read God's scroll and understand it. Verse 19, the poor or downtrodden and remnant will rise up in joy-filled worship. Verses 20 and 21, the ruthless oppressors, both inside the community and outside are gonna be crushed and gone. Verses 22 and 23, the children of Abraham will be redeemed. They will glory in God's work. It says there, "No longer will Jacob be ashamed; no longer will their faces grow pale. When they see among them their children, the work of my hands, they will keep my name holy; they will acknowledge the Holy One, holiness of the Holy One of Jacob, and they will stand in awe of the God of Jacob." You know what I call that? That's worship friends. Stand in awe of the God of Jacob. And then the final verse, verse 24, "Those who are wayward in spirit." What's it mean? “Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it.” Do you feel that, your heart “prone to wander. Prone to leave the God you love,” “Those who are wayward in spirit will gain understanding; and those who complain will accept instruction” and will be transformed.

So application. How does this chapter preach Christ? Well, it does, friends. [chuckle] The only hope for the wayward human heart is the blood of Jesus. It is through Christ, the son of God, who gave himself on the cross to take our wrath, the judgement we deserve, for all this wickedness, this coldness, this wretchedness. He has taken that on himself and he has extinguished the wrath of God in our place. By his blood shed on the cross, God is at peace with all who repent and trust in Jesus. So repent and trust in Jesus. Turn away from idolatry. Turn away from wickedness, turn away from these things that do not satisfy, but actually corrupt your hearts, turn away from them and find in Jesus the only pure delight there really is in this world. Turn to Jesus, trust in him. Perhaps you were invited here by a friend, you don't know Christ as your Lord and Savior, please trust in him now. Please talk to somebody who is a believer and tell them, ‘I wanna know more about Christ, I wanna follow Jesus. I don't wanna be on the outside anymore, I wanna be a true Christian. How can I do that?’ But all you need to do is repent and believe in Christ.

And then for all of those of us that are Christians, just look at this chapter and say, is this applicable to me? Am I like this? Do I have a hard time hearing God's word? Is it like a closed book to me, am I cold and dead toward it? Is my heart distant from God? Is it true that I'm going through the motions coming to church week after week, and I don't have that genuine heart of affection? Have I forsaken my first love? Did I used to have a fiery heart after Christ, but now it's not so much that way. Maybe you need that pleasing pain in your life, maybe you need to be convicted. Stare at verse 13. And if you feel the pain, praise God, it means you're alive, but don't let it stay there. Say, ‘God change me. Transform my heart, make me different.’ Work of Christ alone can do that.

I just wanna conclude with a couple of comments that I think might be helpful for our church, just where we're at right now. The New Testament gives us various metaphors for the church: Bride of Christ, light shining in a dark place, city on a hill, sometimes we're likened to a building made up of living stones, and a priesthood within that building offering spiritual sacrifices to God. Sometimes we're called a holy nation. I’d like to zero in on the image of family. How's that? Family of God. We are a family. This church is a family. We have the same heavenly Father who adopted us, we are his sons and daughters through faith in Jesus, we have the same elder brother who is not ashamed to call us family members. That's amazing. Who shed his blood for us. We have the same indwelling spirit that cries out from within us, the spirit of adoption by which we cry Abba, Father, we're a family.

Now, as a family, we are committed to each other. We're in covenant commitment. Guess where the covenant is, we promise to be things for each other. And that means we carry each other's burdens, and when we don't agree, we strive to understand one another, listening without anger to each other. Loving each other, like that expression ‘as iron sharpens iron,’ both pieces of iron need to recognize that they need to change too. Not just the other piece of iron, and as the two interact in a godly way, I could go really into engineering right now, but when you're doing some machining, you need a cooling lubricant there to keep the heat down. Do you know what I'm saying? To keep the heat down or else they're gonna be damaged, there's gonna be damage, and so love, love is that cooling lubricant. But we need to sharpen one another. We haven't arrived there.

Now, last week, a number of you noticed that our corporate worship time was a little different than it usually is, music a little louder, a little faster than you're used to, maybe a new song you hadn't heard before, some of you were delighted by it. Some of you just noticed it was different and it was a matter of indifference to you. Some of you didn't like it at all. Well, I can tell you this, every brother and sister that stood up here and has sought to lead this church in worship since Eric Campbell left in this interim time that we're in, that's what we're in now, interim time, until the Lord brings us an elder that will be gifted and will work on music, every single one of them, I know them, has done what they have done out of a love for God and for his glory and for this church. They've sacrificed their time, they've sacrificed their energy, they've brought their gifts, and they've sought to use them for the glory of God. And they have full-time jobs, they have other things that take their time, and they have given to us, and they should be thanked and encouraged for it, even if you didn't like that song so much.

But on the other side, it's also important for us as elders, and I'm speaking as an elder now, as a shepherd with the other shepherds of this flock, it's important for us to lead this flock through the changes I think God has for us to make. To lead this flock sensitively and in a good pace, gently, patiently, we have a journey to travel. We have not arrived yet, and ultimately, we are responsible for the things that happen here at the human level, and we failed you to some degree, we didn't stay together the way we needed to in terms of pacing and other things. Now, as a family, we act in grace toward one another, unless you're in that one perfect family in this church, and which you'd never need that, but there isn't such. And you know, we've got to cover each other. Pray for each other. Carry each other's burdens. Now, in the 14 years that I've been here as pastor of FBC, there have been many changes, it's a very different church than the one that I inherited in October of 1998, those changes have been deep and profound and essential. And I think biblical. Everything the Lord has led FBC to do in those 14 years have been geared toward making us more biblically faithful to be healthy for the long haul, for the long term, so that after, if the Lord tarries and he doesn't come back in our generation, this church will still be here testifying to the greatness and the glory of God in this community, so it will be healthy and bear good fruit. That's what we're trying to do.

And one of the significant changes that's happened here has been the move from the single pastor model, the senior pastor who's kind of the boss, and then deacons that kind of, I don't wanna go into all that. Anyway, ask me about it if you weren't here in those days, I'll tell you all about it. But to go away from that to a plurality of elders in which there’s shared leadership of godly men who have made it through the filter of 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1, and who seek to serve together and to lead the church together. And I think that's been absolutely right, and it's been one of the greatest blessings of my life, and these men have given me so much good counsel over the last week, and over the last years we've been together, it's just a privilege to minister with them.

And that's why we have made changes in our Sunday school ministry, to go to a BFL five year where you're getting basically like a Bible education, Bible college education or seminary education, if you just do those tracks, over five years. It's really a blessing. It's to prepare you for works of service for the future. And we've added elders with term limits, and there's a whole thought to that, and building leadership development pipeline for the future generation of elders, so that young men are trained up, those that have an ambition 1 Timothy 3:1, have set their heart to be an overseer, they're trained and prepared so that the church is ready to receive them when they're ready to serve, discipling our directors so that they can do excellent ministry now and then serve in amazing ways, either this church or another church setting in the future. Developing an intern program, many of you don't know that we have that, but training seminary students in a kind of an on-site church-based internship. It's not the most awesome internship program in the country, but it's pretty good, and we've had every semester some great young men that are learning and growing, developing our deacons.

 All of this has been, and Ashok really just gave me some insight on this, but a prepare and send motion here, not a build and settle and enjoy motion. Does that make sense, the difference between the two? It's all toward prepare and send, not just settle in and enjoy. That static thing can be very dangerous, and I think it leads right to the problems of Isaiah 29, that settled, dead formalism. And in that vein, we've made significant changes in our worship style. And it may keep evolving within the bounds of our values in a way that we seek always to honor the Lord.

Now, when it comes to corporate worship, the elders are united, that the primary sound of corporate worship, if an outsider should come in and listen, the primary sound they should hear are your voices united in passionate song. That's what they should hear. And Isaiah 29:13 goes right to that issue, if you let that text work on you, then come next Sunday and sing with all your heart. Whether it's your favorite song or not. Brothers and sisters, God wants your hearts, not just on Sunday morning, he wants seven days a week, he wants it all the time, but let's not minimize the importance of our corporate worship. These are like dress rehearsals for heaven. And you get to look around and see other people that God's working on, it's just so powerful. He wants you, he wants your hearts. He wants you to put away your idols and the things done in secret when you think God doesn't know what you're doing, put the sin to death so that you can worship.

God's grace is there, it's sufficient for all your sin, his mercies are new every morning. Let's come next week clean and ready to worship. Don't let it be said of any of you, “These people honor me with the lips, but their hearts are far from me,” hand your hearts to the Lord, say ‘God I have allowed the busyness of this life, I've allowed the desires for worldly things, I've allowed some sins to creep in and crowd out my love for you. Please draw me back. Please heal me. Please. And he will. He will. And worship in spirit and in truth. In truth. Study the Scripture, study the doctrines, get your mind focused on the doctrines that we have, the greatness of God, the sinfulness of the human race, our great need, and Christ the Redeemer, study the incarnation, the doctrine of the Trinity, study the miracles and the words of Jesus and greatly study the cross and the theology of the cross, get your mind around these truths and then let your heart be passionate about them.

Now, in future weeks, months, years, the united desire of the elders in corporate worship is to steer, I think a safe middle course between two deadly extremes. On the one side is the danger of cold traditionalism leading to religious formalism and hypocrisy, which this text covers. So if there's a static feel and over a generation, two, three, nothing can change, we have inherited this worship style and nothing can change, that's just a recipe for disaster. And we have decided, we have desired to loose the moorings from that and to be free from that so that we are not just traditionalists and formalist, that's not to say that we don't learn from the past. We've got to sing the hymns and know church history. I love church history, I'm all for it. But that we embrace what's right and then just keep moving. But on the other side, worldliness that thinks that anything that's trendy out there in popular culture and anything that is effective and moves people's hearts can be dropped wholesale right in the middle of worship and used without being assessed or filtered in any way. That's deadly on the other side. Now we'll do a good or not good job on that as the Lord... and we're gonna keep trying to follow... and it's like this, we are not perfect people. But that's what we're trying to do. Does that make sense? So we're trying to navigate between those.

We want our true worship sound to be your hearts singing, praising God telling him, ‘thank you for saving me. Thank you Jesus for shedding your blood for me, what you did on the cross and at the empty tomb is enough for me to be happy right now.’ So let's put away all anger, let's put away all factions, and let's put away all divisions and all self-righteousness that assumes that you have the whole picture and the whole truth on this issue. Let's put that away, let's put away all selfishness, let's put away all efforts to twitle the knobs and flip the switches of the church to get the lighting just right for your taste, and the cushion under your seat just right for your taste, and the temperature just right for your taste, and the sounds coming into your ears just right for your taste. I can tell you with great confidence, the next time that all of us will be perfectly satisfied with every sight that comes in our eyes and every sound that comes in our ears will be in heaven, not now.

 So we're all gonna have to put up with something, so let's put up with it together, what do you say? Pray for the elders to have wisdom and to make wise choices and to lead well, in the meantime, hand God your heart and say, ‘let it not be said of me, this person honors me with his lips, but his heart is far from me.’

Close with me in prayer. Father, we thank you for the time we've had to study your word. We pray that you would please drive its truth home. I pray that we'd stare into the mirror of Isaiah 29:13 and let it do its painful, pleasureful work in us to bring us to a far healthier worship of Jesus than we have ever experienced before. In Jesus name, Amen.

An expository sermon on Isaiah 28:23-29 explores how God taught science to mankind as a means to worship and how they suppressed the truth and turned against their Creator.

 Right out in front of the Oxford University Museum of Natural History in England, there is a statue of Sir Isaac Newton seated, chin in hand, pondering an apple at his feet. And it's obviously a statue of a famous moment in history of modern science, in which Isaac Newton saw an apple fall, some say it hit him in the head. I don't know, I wasn't there. But in 1666, he considered the journey of this apple, then he began to ask a question, the question was this: "If the force of gravity reaches to the top of the highest tree, why couldn't it reach the moon?"| And so, it was a flash of insight as you watched this apple fall. Throughout the history of science, there have been flashes of insight that have come to scientists that have guided science along throughout human history. 

Thomas Edison, the famous inventor, said that genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. I'm here to say today to God be the glory for both. God gives the inspiration and he gives the perspiration that his guided genius has guided science throughout history, and I wanna take back and give to God the glory for these things that modern atheistic scientists seek to take away and give to man alone. In Isaiah 28, it teaches that God instructs and teaches man the right way concerning science. 

Flashes of insight and long careful development, both come from God. So, a summary of my message today is that scripture reveals God as the teacher of humanity. He is the teacher of the lessons of his glorious creation, whether they recognize him or not. That God has guided the development of human science in all areas and to God be the glory for that development. For every truth that science has ever taught comes from God.

 However, in the 21st century, especially in the western world, science is seen to be a rival to faith. It's grown to be a rival to God. Even a system by which some people think they can prove that God doesn't exist at all. How ironic. God gives us the wisdom, the weapons of wisdom and technology, and we then turn them on him as if we can destroy him with them. Puritan pastor Cotton Mather, speaking of material prosperity, not of science, but a material prosperity, looking at the Puritan movement, especially the New England Puritans, he said this: "Piety, godliness, gave birth to prosperity and the daughter devoured the mother." So, in other words, as the New England Puritans got wealthy through their godliness, they lost their godliness through their wealth. Well, the same thing has happened, it seems with science. The godliness gave birth to science and science now sees to devour what gave it birth. 

The 1978 astrophysicist and hobby historian Michael H. Hart, wrote a provocative book called, ‘The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History’. Very provocative, very controversial. His number one most influential person of history was Muhammad. His number two was Isaac Newton, number three was Jesus Christ. Now, I don't know if Isaac Newton had genuine faith in the Triune God and the deity of Christ. Now, there's questions about that. But let's hope for his sake, that he did. Imagine him up in heaven realizing he is in second place and Jesus in third, and how amazing and ironic that would be. It shows how we in the west value science above even Christian faith. But God gives the flashes of insight, and he does it all to bless humanity, and he does it through people, and often, often cases through people who don't even acknowledge him as he's doing it.

Science is a good gift from God. Should never be feared. It is a platform for a deeper worship of God. Think of Psalm 8, what David wrote in verse 3 and 4: "When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have made. What is man that you are mindful of him? The son of man, that you care for him?" Careful cosmological observation by David, that science led him to worship, and to be humble. And so it should be. Science is a good gift from God by studying the physical universe, we can use many useful things, helpful for life, things that can enrich our lives: electronics, medicine, aviation. Good science can also point, if you know what to look for, to the existence of God. But science also has its limitations, science can make us proud, science can make us independent of God.

God has willed that is impossible for any of us to find him through science directly. Through man's wisdom alone, no one will be saved. God has willed this. We'll talk about this in 1 Corinthians chapter 1. And it is not by science that our souls will be saved. Faith operates in a higher realm than science. Not contradicting it, not opposing it, just above it. Science cannot falsify faith claims, therefore, it cannot make any statements about the truth of those claims. You can't devise an experiment by which we can prove that God doesn't exist, or that he does.

God creates the laws of science for his own glory, and he is not subject to them, but rules over them for his own glory. That is my purpose today to give God glory for this, for science. So this is a bit different sermon than I usually preach. My purposes today are not apologetic, I'm not here to defend the faith to skeptics and unbelievers. So if this thing gets out on the internet and Richard Dawkins listens to it, he's not going to be persuaded by what I'm saying. I'm not talking to him, I'm talking in-house to believers. I'm talking to brothers and sisters in Christ, and saying that from this text and expanding out from the Scripture to God be the glory for everything that science has ever devised. It's a time of worship for us. So, let's try to be somewhat expositional this morning, amen? Just for a while, anyway, 15 minutes of exposition and then the rest will be topical. Okay, is that alright?

So this morning, we're going to start with just the passage in context and try to understand it, and then I'm gonna go off and discuss science based on it. So let's look at the context of Isaiah 28, I already preached through three-quarters of this chapter in the last sermon I was preaching a few weeks ago. We see in Isaiah 28, a judgment of God on the northern kingdom of Ephraim of Israel for their wickedness and for their sins. Sins of drunkenness and idolatry, of irreligion. And we saw in verses 9 and 10 of this chapter, that Israel's leaders were mocking Isaiah's prophecies in reference to Judah, the southern kingdom, and they were saying, "Do and do, do and do, rule and rule," etcetera. Which in the Hebrew is, “Sav lasav sav lasav, kav lakav, kav lakav”. Just yada, yada, yada, that kind of thing.

And they were mocking God's word, and so God said, very ominously, "Very well then, since you won't listen to the clear prophetic word, I'll speak to you through a foreign language, I'll speak to you through men of another tongue, and they'll come to your hometown and they'll speak that language, right in your streets. And you'll understand what I'm saying to you then, the judgment of God has come at last because of your sins." Ultimately though in this chapter, they reject the rock, the foundation rock, the cornerstone, who is Jesus Christ. In verse 16, it says, this is what the Sovereign Lord says, "Behold, I lay a stone in Zion, a tested stone, a precious corner stone for a sure foundation, and the one who trusts in him will never be dismayed." That stone is Jesus Christ. The New Testament makes it plain, Jesus is the foundation stone for the temple, the spiritual building of God. Jesus is the cornerstone and we can trust in him, the son of God who came, who came to Earth, who was incarnate by the power of the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, who lived a sinless life, who did miracles, who taught mighty words, and who proclaimed the gospel of the coming kingdom of God. And who especially shed his blood on the cross, who died in our place, and who was raised from the dead on the third day. This is the Gospel of Jesus Christ and if you believe in the Gospel, you will be saved.

And friend, you may be on the outside looking in, on the outside of Christian faith looking in. You may be interested, your interest may be piqued about the whole science thing. That's not gonna save your soul. This message will. So if you hear nothing else I say, hear this, the Gospel of Jesus Christ alone saves sinners and all you need to do is trust in Jesus. Don't trust in your own works, don't trust in your own righteousness, but trust in Christ and he will give you the gift of righteousness and the gift of eternal life. The gift of the indwelling Holy Spirit, the gift of adoption as sons and daughters of the living God, he will give you heaven as a gift. All of these things freely as a gift. And then he'll give you a new life. When by the power of the Holy Spirit, you can work out your salvation with fear and trembling, you can put sin to death. You can do good works, as we're talking about, as Adam said that we are prepared to do good works, by involvement in a good church. We can do those good works but none of them make us any more righteous, none of them make us any more acceptable to God, none of them make us any more adopted or any more indwelt by the Holy Spirit or any more certain of going to heaven. Those things are just gifts of God. So believe the Gospel, it's a center piece of every text and of every sermon.

Now, these Jewish people in those days thought, people in the southern kingdom of Judah, that they could make a covenant with death, they could make an arrangement, and that death would circumvent them, and I think they were reaching out to Egypt for military allies and all of this, they make a covenant with death, and they thought they could avoid the coming judgment, but that covenant with death would fail. Verse 18: "Your covenant with death will be annulled, your agreement with the grave will not stand. When the overwhelming scourge sweeps by, you will be beaten down by it." And the end of the section I preached there in verse 22, he says, "The Lord Almighty has told me of the destruction decreed against this whole land." So this is really, those 22 verses are dreadful and terrifying, a word of woe right at the very beginning, verse 1: "And destruction decreed against the whole land." Verse 22 it's a word of terrible warning.

And at the end of this chapter comes this little parable, this agricultural parable about a farmer in his land and techniques of agriculture, which you heard Tim read. Listen again to these words: "Listen and hear my voice, pay attention and hear what I say. When a farmer plows for planting, does he plow continually? Does he keep on breaking up and harrowing the soil? When he has leveled the surface, does he not sow caraway and scatter cumin, does he not plant wheat in its place, barley in its plot and spelt in its field? His God instructs him and teaches him the right way. Caraway is not threshed with a sledge, nor is a cartwheel rolled over cumin. Caraway is beaten out with a rod and cumin with a stick. Grain must be ground to make bread, so one does not go on threshing it forever. Though he drives the wheels of his threshing cart over it, his horses do not grind it." Verse 29: "All of this also comes from the Lord Almighty, wonderful in counsel, magnificent in wisdom." 

Straightforward lesson, in context. If the farmer knows when to stop plowing, how much more does God know when to stop judging his people? If the farmer knows when to stop threshing and to start making the bread, how much more does God know when enough is enough? And so it's really a word of comfort and consolation to a people about to be judged by God. God will not destroy them, he will not wipe them off the face of the earth, that's the lesson. God knows when to stop crushing his people and to start rebuilding them. So that's the point of the parable, in context. Look at the details, he begins by calling for attention, he asks for them to listen to him, in verse 23, "Listen and hear my voice, pay attention, and hear what I say." This is characteristic of wisdom literature. Where in Proverbs 1, “Wisdom”, personified wisdom, “cries aloud in the streets.” “How long will you simple ones love your foolishness. Come and listen to me and eat what is good and be wise.” It's a calling out to people to listen to wisdom. “Whoever listens to me”, Proverbs 133, "Will live in safety and be at ease without fear of harm." So it's a cry of God really to listen to his words.

The lesson of the farmer's knowledge in verse 24, "When a farmer plows for planting, does he plow continually? Does he keep on plowing? Does he keep on breaking up and harrowing the soil." Obviously, a question, the implied answer is, “No”, he doesn't keep on plowing forever. He knows when the plowing's done. And when all of this plowing is done, it would be a metal pointed stick maybe tipped with bronze. Eventually, they found that bronze was too soft, so then they used iron, a little bit harder, could break up the soil. That's what was happening. And then after that came the harrowing of the soil, which would be heavy logs with spikes coming out of it, chained together, and they would drag it across the plowed earth, leveling it and flattening it and smoothing it out and making it ready for the seeds. 

And after all of this work was done, then it was time to plant the seed, verse 25, "When he has leveled the surface, does he not sow caraway and scatter cumin? Does he not plant wheat in its place? Barley in its plot, spelt in its field?" The idea is that each seed is dealt with a different way. The very fine black cumin seeds are scattered indiscriminately over the surface, you don't have to be careful about them, they'll do just fine. So you just scatter those fine little seeds over there and they'll be fine, but larger seeds like the wheat and the barley have to be pushed down into the surface, into the prepared soil, and that's how they're going to thrive. Each seed dealt with a little bit differently. Spelt is planted at the edges of the field, because it grows up really tall and provides a natural boundary for the field, preventing animals from coming in, and other farmers knowing that that's the edge of the field. So, all of this was worked out and God knew all of this before the farmer did. He knew it all, he knew exactly what to do with agriculture. And here's the key statement in verse 26: "His God instructs him and teaches him the right way." So again, in context, the logic of the passage that the farmer knows when to stop plowing and harrowing the soil. How much more does God know when his people have had enough? 

He doesn't go on plowing endlessly, he knows how to leave a remnant of the Jews who aren't destroyed and from them to build his future people. He continues in the second half: "Caraway is not threshed with a sledge nor is a cartwheel rolled over cumin. Caraway is beaten out with a rod and cumin with a stick. Grain must be ground to make bread, so one doesn't go on threshing it forever. Though he drives the wheels of his threshing cart over it, his horses do not grind it." So, we move from plowing and planting then to the threshing that happens after the harvest.

The same techniques are not gonna be used on small grains that you use on larger grains. With wheat and barley, you have an animal tethered to a central post, and he's dragging a heavy threshing sled with stones or bits of metal that just break it apart and separate the kernel from the husk. But you can't do that with the smaller harvest, the smaller seeds that are harvested. There you're gonna use a flail, which would be two sticks connected with a leather strap, and they beat it out. I actually, got to do this a year ago in Nepal. I wasn't very good at it. It provided a good chance for them to laugh at me and it was an opening for the Gospel. I didn't know the technique, but watching them, they were just very good at it, and they knew how to use the flail to do the threshing. Separating out the kernel from the husk. And Isaiah's point in the second half is the same as the first, the farmer knows what to do the thresh and he knows when to stop threshing and start to make the bread. He knows when enough is enough. And he ends with the same kind of statement in verse 29: "All of this also comes from the Lord Almighty, wonderful in counsel, magnificent in wisdom." God knew the science of agriculture before the farmer did and he's the one that taught it to the farmer. 

So how much more does he know how to deal with his people? When his people have had enough, God will stop. And so later in Isaiah in chapter 40:1-2, he'll say, very beautifully, he'll tell his prophet to tell the people: "Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem. And proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin has been paid for, that she has received from the Lord's hand double for all her sins”. The time has come. It's done now, there's no more judgment now, it's over. The time has come to rebuild now. 

So I'm gonna stop right here and just give an application of this to us. Do you realize that tenderness and the gentleness and the wisdom of God in dealing with you? That God does not burden you with more trials than you can handle, he knows when enough is enough, he knows when you can't handle anymore, he knows when to stop the trials. And say that those trials have done their work on your heart, your heart has been plowed enough, the harvest has been trashed enough, he knows when to stop. God is faithful, he will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you can bear. He knows when to stop. Twice, in Peter's Epistle, 1 Peter, he teaches this same thing, he talks about the joy that believers have in coming to faith in Christ and knowing our inheritance. This great joy that we have, this joy unspeakable and full of glory. He says, "In this salvation, you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, you may have had to suffer grief and all kinds of trials." Did you hear that? Now, for a little while, you may have had to suffer grief and all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith of greater worth than gold which perishes, even though refined by fire may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.

God brings the trials into your life to purify your faith so that Jesus gets glory when he returns, but notice, he does it for a little while. The trials are necessary, but not too much of them. He knows when to stop, and he teaches the same thing at the end of the book. In 1 Peter 5:8-10, he says, "Be self-controlled and alert your enemy, the devil prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kinds of sufferings." And God, after you have suffered for a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. Isn't that marvelous? God measures out how much Satan, the roaring lion can get at you and then he moves them aside and says, "That's enough." God is so wise in dealing with us.

What are you going through right now? What is bringing pain in your life? What is causing you suffering? What are you struggling with? Understand those days, indeed those hours, minutes and seconds have been measured out by God. He is wise. He doesn't go on plowing you forever, he doesn't go on thrashing you forever. And there's gonna come a day when there's no more of any of it, no more death, mourning, crying, pain and he is preparing you for that day. So give him the glory and trust him as you're going through trials. Though you are burdened, though you may be crying, though you may be weak and weary, you should cry out to God but know this, he has measured out the days of your trials and they will not be too many. He knows when to stop.

Thus ends the exposition. Now we go topical. I think this passage teaches a secondary lesson, now, the thing with expositional preaching, the definition of it is that the point of the text is the point of the sermon. Well, the point of the text has been the point of the sermon up until now. But I want to take a moment and just talk about science. Just because I think it's important in 21st century America, I think it's something we Christians deal with every day. And if you're in certain settings on a college campus or in a laboratory working as a scientist or whatever, you may deal with this topic every day of your life.

Science has come to dominate our culture in ways scarcely imaginable 200 years ago. Science changed everything, the way people lived, all of the externals and the patterns of our lives were changed by scientific insights, people lived about the same way for millennia, you think about the agriculture, the agrarian nature of life, the way that people would be transported from one place to another. I'm not saying there weren't some technological advances along the way but progress was very slow.

Look at the Native Americans who lived in North America for centuries, basically, inheriting a way of life from their forefathers and living that out and passing it on to their children, and very little changed. And the same was true for the most part of many places around the world. But science flourished where Biblical faith grew and developed, especially New Testament faith. It flourished because we saw in the regularity of the creation, a God who created all things to be regular like that. We saw in the words of scripture, for example, right after the flood, God spoke concerning the regularity of nature, said, "As long as earth endures seed time and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease." So that regularity has come from the mind of God, from the character of God. Those things will not stop until the Earth ends.

C.S. Lewis said this, "Men became scientific because they expected law in nature." And they expected law in nature because they believed in a law giver. Regions of the world dominated by animism or polytheism, or even some of the major world religions, Buddhism, Hinduism, and even Islam, did not develop in the same way that places where Christianity had taken root developed. But the west through the industrial revolution as science continued to learn and make valid insights and develop valid products and valid medicines and all that, grew to fall in love with science and forget the one who gave it. 

Now, what do we mean by science? Well, the scientific method is well known. You probably studied it when you were in high school, what the scientific method is: you make an observation of the surrounding world, for example, this corn is better than that corn, taller, richer, greener, just better. Then you ask a question, "Gee, I wonder why. Why is that corn better than this corn?" And you notice that some cow manure got dumped at the bottom of that corn and not at the other corn. So then you formulate a hypothesis, "Gee, I wonder if cow manure are might help the corn to grow better?" So then you craft an experiment to find out if this hypothesis could be true or not, "Tell you what I'll plant... Next year, I'll plant one tenth, 'cause I'm not sure about this idea but anyway, one tenth of my corn with cow manure in it and the rest in the regular way." And then you watch and see what happens. You analyze the data. Sure enough, the corn did grow taller and richer and better. So the next year you maybe do half of your field with cow manure and the other half not. Over a period of time, you eventually draw a tested conclusion from these experiments. You settle that conclusion, namely, cow manure helps corn grow well into a larger system of truth about agriculture, things you've already learned. And then you publish your findings to other farmers so that they can grow from it and you can grow from their observations. 

There my friends is science, that's what it is. That's what it does, it's been doing it for centuries now, that pattern of eight steps. But now the scientific method is coming back to devour the God who gave it to begin with, especially since Darwin published ‘The Origin of the Species’ in 1859. Scientists have become bolder in saying everything in the universe can be answered by science. Peter Atkins, Professor of Chemistry at Oxford said this, "Science emerged from religion, as science discarded the cocoon, its cocoon to become its present butterfly, it took over the whole garden. There is no reason to suppose that science cannot deal with every aspect of existence."

Nobel laureate Steven Weinberg said this, "The world needs to wake up from the long nightmare of religion, anything we scientists can do to weaken the hold of religion should be done. And may in fact be our greatest contribution to humankind." So in other words, we are at war, science and religion are at war, and good scientists will do everything they can to win that battle. Richard Dawkins wrote a book called ‘The God Delusion’. Any of you folks deluded today? [chuckle] Deluded that there is a God. He says there's bunch of chemical reactions in the brain, he just believes in natural selection, evolution, that whole thing, he says, "Religion itself can be explained by physics." He says, "Everything in the universe can be accounted for by the blind laws of physics, and that religion is not merely a delusion but a dangerous delusion." Dawkins says this, "I'm utterly fed up with the respect we have been brainwashed into giving to religion."

So, if you didn't think we're at war, we're at war, at least in the minds of some, many and this is part of the culture we live in, part of the air that we breathe. Christians can feel backed into a corner when dealing with intelligent scientists, atheistic scientists, back on our heels. Atheistic scientists claim that people resort to gods or a God when they don't understand something. It's called the ‘God of the gaps theory’. So where there's a gap in human knowledge, we stick a god or gods in there, superstitions and myths.

Basically, modern atheistic scientists are saying, "We see where science is going and things we used to say the gods did, we now know why they happen. And so we see where all is is going, there's still many unanswered questions, but some day there won't be any. Some day we'll know everything, and then there'll be no God or gods at all. So why don't we just go there now? Why don't we just say, there is no God now. We see where it's going. So enough of the God of the gaps.” Well, this is sheer arrogance. Do you not see it? This is how it works, if I study some laws of cause and effect, I can say there's no God who made either cause or effect? If some superstitious people have ascribed to thunder and lightning, the activity of Zeus, and then we learn that it's very much like static discharge done by Ben Franklin and other things, we say, "Okay, I guess the clouds are rubbing into each other and creating static electricity, and that's where the thunder and lightning comes from, therefore there's no God?" How do we figure that out? How do we go from one to the next? But that's what scientists are saying.

Now, Isaiah 28, the text we're looking at this morning, suggests that all of the scientific insights have been taught directly by God. That God's the one that instructs the farmer on the science of agriculture, and I'm going beyond that to say, God has taught us everything we've ever learned, everything we know, God has taught it to us. To God be the glory for the physical universe he made and the science that has studied it, and the whispering he's done in the ears of scientists along the way, in which he has instructed and taught them the right way, and that's what the text says. Look at verse 26 again, “His God instructs him and teaches him the right way.” The Hebrew words are very potent actually. The science of agriculture is the subject, God is the teacher, the farmer is the pupil. It literally says, "for" It's omitted in the NIV, but it's, "For his God instructs him and teaches him the right way." The reason he plows this way, the reason he acts way, is that God has taught in what to do. And it says very strongly, God instructs him rightly, literally, justly. So there's a justice to the agricultural science, similar to the moral law of the universe, this is the right way to handle these things. It's a very strong statement his God teaches them the just way or the right way. 

And then at the end, look at verse 29, "All this also comes from the Lord Almighty, wonderful in council, magnificent in wisdom.” God teaches everything. Look what it says, "Lets start with magnificent wisdom." God just knows the right way to do things, everything, and then he's wonderful in counsel. He gives advice, "Hey, why don't you try this?" So God's magnificent in these things, he knows what to do, and he tells us what would work best. Now, when did all this start? I tell you, it started back in the garden of Eden. Started right back at the beginning when God made Adam out of the dust of the earth. And it says in Genesis chapter 2, if you look, you don't have to turn there, but in verses 4 and 5, it says, "When the Lord God made the heavens and the earth, and no shrub of the field had yet sprung up. And no plant or herb of the field had yet sprung up, had not appeared on the Earth for the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth. [Listen] And there was no man to work the ground." That's fascinating.

Back in Genesis chapter 1 in the third day of creation, God made seed-bearing plants. The genetic code in the seed and they were gonna reproduce according to their kind, according to their seed. So he created these types of plants that could not grow, they could not develop without human cultivation. They're needed human beings, farmers to raise those particular types of plants up. And so agricultural science tells us what they are, for example, you never find corn growing in the wild ever. If you ever walk through the woods and come to a stand of corn, you know there are people nearby, and there are many other such crops. God linked those crops to human involvement. Well, then you think, "Okay, Adam gets born, made, crafted out of the dust of the earth, what does he know?" Friends, nothing. He doesn't know anything. "Well, how is he gonna know what to do with those herbs and plants of the field?" Well, his God will instruct him and teach them the right way. He'll teach him what to do. Just like Jesus said about his relationship with his father, he said, "I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing on his own. He can only do what his father tells him to do. Because his father shows him everything he's doing." That intimate father-son relationship. And in Jesus's genealogy in Luke 3, it said that Adam was the son of God. And so the Father would teach the son, Adam, what to do with the garden. He would teach him how to make those crops flourish. And He put him in the garden to serve it and protect it, it literally says in Genesis 2:15, that was his job to make those crops come to their full fruition. 

But I'm gonna go beyond just agriculture, I think that's where it started. But remember in Genesis 2, there was a river that went through the garden and broke into headwaters, and then it goes out into different lands, and there's onyx out there, and there's aromatic resin, and there's gold, it's like, "What am I gonna do with onyx and aromatic resin and gold?" Well, God will instruct him and teach him the right way. He'll teach him what to do with all those things, what they're good for, what they're not good for. The science of the earth, dear friends, God was gonna teach it to them. And God's was gonna teach science to all humanity because it was gonna be part of our relationship, our love relationship with God, we were going to love the Lord, our God with all our heart, our soul and our mind. The first and greatest commandment.

And God had filled the world with his glory. Genesis 1:1, "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth." And it says in Isaiah 6, the seraphim crying out, "Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord Almighty, the whole earth is full of his glory." And it was our job as human beings to learn that glory, to study that glory. Habakkuk 2:14 on this map out here, "The earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea." We were the scientists, we were the ones who were gonna study and the topic would be God. The topic would be God and his glory woven into every atom, every fiber of the universe. But then sin entered the world. Genesis chapter 3, tragically, they were drawn away, enticed by a different kind of knowledge an arrogant ambition to be like God. To know good and evil to become like God, and they ate from that tree. And God had woven and clear evidence of himself and creation, Romans 1:20, "For since the creation of the world, God's invisible qualities –his eternal power and his divine nature – are clearly understood from what has been made." But men, now in sin, worshipping themselves really suppress or hold down that truth in unrighteousness, that there is a God, that he made all these things that creation testifies to the greatness and the existence of God. So they suppress it in unrighteousness.

I find that interesting, holding It down. Came across a quote by Francis Crick, Watson and Crick were the ones that came up with the DNA double helix thing, they won the Nobel Prize for it. Guys, an arch-atheist biologist, and he said this, "Biologists must constantly keep in mind that what they see was not designed, but rather evolved." What a fascinating quote. You have to work hard when you're in the lab or just constantly keep in mind, it was not designed, but it was evolved. It was not designed, but it was evolved, you have to constantly... You have to work hard at it. Actually Richard Dawkins said this, "Living objects look designed, they look overwhelmingly as though they were designed, but they weren't.” Does that not sound like suppressing the truth and unrighteousness to you? A design means what? A designer, dear friends. And so it got worse. Although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images. They exchange the truth of God for a lie and worshipped and served created things rather than the creator. You wanna know the number one created thing they worship and serve? Their own brains, themselves. That's what they're worshipping, that's what they're serving. 

And yet for all of that, God still will to teach the human race science, he still will to do it. And so people discovered scientific truths, but now corrupt, they start to use them for evil purposes. Prime example is the Tower of Babel. Remember how they said in Genesis 11, “‘Come let us make bricks and bake them thoroughly.’ And they covered them with tar for mortar and they said, ‘Come, let's build us a city with a tower that reaches up to the heavens so that we can make a name for ourselves.’” Oh, they're no longer living for the glory of God's name, they're living for their own name. Interestingly, God said some amazing things at that point. He said, if as one people speaking one language that they began to do this, then nothing they proposed to do will be withheld from them. God knew what he put into the mind of man and the greatness of being in the image of God and the danger at that point, so he retarded it all, slowed it down by confusing the languages. It was God that taught them the ceramics. It was God that taught them advanced building techniques. It was God that taught them these things, but they used them for wicked purposes. 

Now, some godly people in the Bible are scientists. A good example of this is Solomon. Solomon begged God for wisdom and God gave it to him, and it branched out into science, it branched out into a study of different types of plants and animals. In 1 Kings 4, it says that Solomon describe plant life from the Cedar of Lebanon to the hyacinth that grows out of the walls. He was a botanist, I guess. He was a biologist, he also taught about animals and birds, and reptiles and fish, a zoologist. Men of all nations came to listen to Solomon's wisdom sent by all the kings of the world who had heard of his wisdom. Even the Queen of Sheba came to test him with difficult questions, and he passed all the tests. Oral exam, PhD, oral exam, and he passed. Amazing! A scientist. And he talks about that in Ecclesiastes, he said, "So, I turned my mind," is Ecclesiastes 7:25, "I turned my mind to understand, to investigate, to search out wisdom, the scheme of things, to understand." And then 7:27, listen to this, "Look, said the teacher, this is what I have discovered. Adding one thing to another to discover the scheme of things." Friends, that's science is what that is, was given as a gift of God to Solomon the king. 

Jesus did the same thing and his teachings. Remember in the Sermon on the Mount, in Matthew 6, he talks to anxious people who are worried about food and clothing and all that sort of stuff. He said, "Why do you worry about food? Study the birds of the air, will you? Study them, watch their habits, watch their techniques. They neither sow, or reap, or store in barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? And why do you worry about clothes? Study the lilies of the field. Look at them carefully. Pick one, go ahead, pick it and look at it. I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. Now, if that's how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you? Oh, you of little faith."

So he's using science and goes from it to spiritual principles of God's care for us to destroy it in a very counseling kind of practical sense your anxiety about food and clothing. He does the same thing concerning his own advent, his coming to earth. He says, "You look at the weather, right? You say, look at the sky, it's red in the morning and today it'd be stormy, and then the night. It'd be fair weather for the sky is red. Now, you know how to interpret the appearance of the sky but you cannot interpret the signs of the times." So he's going to meteorology there. Oh, you guys are studying the weather patterns, why don't you study what's happening with me now? And he does that concerning his second coming, "As lightning that flashes in the east is visible in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man." So bottom line, God is the teacher of science, always has been, always will be, and science can be used to the glory of God.

He also teaches science to atheists who give him no credit at all. Look in your Bible a few pages up to Isaiah 45:3-7…Wow, I have two spiders on my microphone here, that is freaky. So, I study of them? What do you think? I don't know. Look into them, into the science. I think there's only... No, there's two of them. Where did it go? That's creepy. Pray for me. Anyway, he says to Cyrus the Great, an empire builder from Persia. This is Isaiah 45:3-7, he says this to him, "I will give you the treasures of darkness, riches stored in secret places so that you may know that I am the Lord, the God of Israel who summons you by name. I summon you by name and I bestow on you a title of honor though you do not acknowledge me. [Do you see that?] I am the Lord and there is no other apart from me, there is no God. I will strengthen you, though you have not acknowledged me so that from the rising of the sun to the place of it setting, men may know there is none besides me. I am the Lord and there is no other. I form the light and create darkness; I bring prosperity and create disaster. I the Lord, do all these things." 

So, God will open the treasures of scientific darkness and give those riches to people who do not acknowledge him. And he does it, I think, in a common grace blessing, like causing the sun to rise on the righteous and the unrighteous, and sending rain on those who acknowledge him and those who don't. And he does this for his own purpose, even to people who suppress the truth in unrighteousness. Now, later in Isaiah 45, you still there. Look at it in verse 15, it says, "Truly, you are a God who hides himself, oh, God and Savior of Israel." God teaches science to atheists and hides himself so that they do not actually know him. Deeper, God uses science to control human history. He gives scientific insights to some peoples and not to others, and in this way causes some nations to rise up higher than others, for his own sovereign purposes. No one from the East to the West can exalt a man, only God can do that, that's Psalm 75. And the Apostle Paul in Athens on Mars Hill, said to those philosophers, those scientists of Athens, said this, "From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth. And he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live." 

How does God control these things? Well, without them knowing it, God directs the minds of the rulers or of the scientists, whatever way he chooses, he has that power to do it. So he'll give an insight on steel, or gunpowder, or free market economies, or other things, and causes some nations to rise up higher than others, for his own purposes, for his own glory. And as science advances, it advances by what they call eureka moments, moments flashes of insight, like Isaac Newton's apple. I don't know if it hit him on the head, but it made him think. The word ‘eureka’ is Greek for "I've found it." It comes from Archimedes who figured out how to discover if the king's crown was made of pure gold or not. When he lowered himself into a tub and the water spilled out, and he thought a specific gravity could sink the crown in there and figured out its density that way. Amazing, eureka, I've found it! 

Well, what he should have said, Isaiah 28, is, “He taught it to me. Thank you, God.” God showed me what to do with specific gravity, and has happened again and again, 1% inspiration, moments of inspiration, God says, "Try this, try this, try this." Whispering in the ears of the scientist, whether they acknowledge him or not. So, there was a scientist working for 3M and they had developed an adhesive that was very weak, didn't hold very well, they didn't know what to do with it. So he's in church and he's singing, and his bookmark keeps sliding out of hymnal, it just keeps sliding down the page. Eureka! Post-it note. Any of you ever used a post-it note? It was in church while the guy was singing. Or another guy goes walking with his dog through the woods and after the walk, he sees a bunch of birds hitchhikers on his sock, his woolen sock. He looks at it for a while, plucks it off, looks at it under a microscope and discovers velcro. These are true stories. 

Science Magazine Top 10 Eureka moments, Aha moments. Of course, number one was Alexander Flemming discovering antibiotics when a bread mold killed a bunch of bacteria. Albert Einstein himself, who went beyond Newtonian physics in about the same way that Newton discovered the first level of physics. He's in a Swiss Patent Office in 1907, and he starts thinking about people falling. And he thought, "If a man falls freely, he would not feel his own weight." And he began thinking about that and started to develop the general theory of relativity. Now took him eight years of mathematics, but God worked it through him and he gave it to him. And to God be the glory for all of us. Now, someday, friends, our minds are gonna be fixed, our hearts are gonna be fixed, we're gonna live in heaven and the world is gonna be filled with the glory of God, and Jesus will be the lamp of the glory of God, and everything we see will radiate with the glory of God, and our minds will see it, and we will study it, and we will give directly God the glory for all of it, for eternity, and the earth will be filled at last with the knowledge of the glory of God as the waters cover the earth.

But there are limitations to science. Science cannot produce faith, it cannot save your soul. Luke 17:20, Jesus said, "The Kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation." So you're careful observation will not bring the kingdom of God. And even better, 1 Corinthians 1:21, "For since in the wisdom of God, the world through its wisdom did not know God. God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe." Alright, just to unravel that, 1 Corinthians 1:21, it was wise for God to set up a world where science couldn't find him. It was wise for God to set up a system where you could only be saved by believing Christ and him crucified. It was wise for God to do that. So no scientists can inch their way toward God by the scientific process, but faith comes by hearing the gospel in that way alone.

Conversely, however, science cannot disprove our faith. It's amazing the arrogant statements made by that. There's no experiment that they can put together to disprove the existence of God. Science is not God's master, God is science's master. God makes laws, but he can break them any time he wants. Amen, Hallelujah. And Jesus broke them a lot: they're called miracles. Alright, he walks on water. What happened to specific gravity there? What happened to gravity itself? Jesus could do anything. Then interestingly, after he walked on water, what did he do? Got in the boat. So both of them are gods, that ordinary technology of flotation and boat development and all that, God's in favor of it. That's our usual way. But he is not behold into it, he can use the boat or not as he chooses. And after his resurrection he flouted the laws of nature again and again, goes right through the walls of the tomb, didn't need the angel to come and move the stone, he was gone already by then. He goes, though the doors are locked for fear of the Jews right through the walls as he chooses. He's eating with the two disciples on the road to a Emmaus, and he break bread and their eyes are opening he disappears. Where did he go? Don't know, next place. And after 40 days of instruction, he's there on the Mount of Olives and he just floats up to heaven until a cloud hides him from their site.

So, he made the laws but he didn't have to follow them. And science can be a basis of worship, it cannot lead us to faith and it can make us arrogant and independent and unthankful. We know 1 Corinthians 8:1, that we all possess knowledge. Knowledge puffs up but love builds up. The man who thinks he knows something, doesn't yet know as he ought to know. Jeremiah 9, this is what the Lord says, "Let not the wise man boast of his wisdom, or the strong man boast of his strength, or the rich man boast of his wealth. But let him who boast, boast about this, that he understands and knows me." Close with me in prayer.

Father, we thank you for the time we've had to study. I pray that these words, some sense they've been long and some sense too short, but that they would be used by you to give us a sense of the glory of God in creation and in science. And I pray that you'd help us to be courageous when we preach the Gospel to our generation and to give you the glory for everything that you've done, in Jesus name. Amen.

Pastor Andy Davis preaches on Isaiah 28:1-29,  calling attention to futile human attempts to attain salvation and the sure salvation that comes from God through Christ.

The greatest preacher of all time is Jesus Christ, to him we give first place and all glory. And he is the greatest preacher, and perhaps his greatest sermon ended with these words, "Everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rains came down and the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, yet it did not fall because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice, like a foolish man who built his house on the sand, and the rains came down and the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash". So ends the Sermon on the Mount. And it is our joy to proclaim to a lost, and a dying world, that there is a solid foundation, there is a rock on which you can build your life and it will not collapse. It's an immovable rock, and his name is Jesus, and he's proclaimed right in this text today, Isaiah 28-16, "Behold, I lay in Zion a stone a tested and precious cornerstone for a sure foundation, and the one who trusts in Him will never be put to shame."

The text also mentions as Jesus's parable at the end of the Sermon on the Mount mentions the testing of the house, and Jesus's parable to individuals, both of them building, building a house, both of them making a selection, but one of them is wise and one of them is foolish, the wise man selects the rock, and the foolish man selects the sand. But both of the houses get tested, the rains come down, the streams rise, the wind beats against the house, both of them tested. And so also in Isaiah 28, "an overwhelming flood is coming, a devastation is coming", And in this chapter, people try to make a separate peace with that, what they call a covenant with death, they try to make a separate arrangement, what I call self-salvation. They try to find a way to get through what's coming, and they cannot. There is only one Savior, there is only one safe refuge from the onslaught that is coming, and we are facing not what the Jews in this chapter were facing, invasion by a gentile army, the Assyrians are gonna sweep in like a flood. We're not facing that, we're facing something far more serious, we're facing death and judgment and hell. And there is only one refuge, and His name is Jesus, and there is such a refuge. And that is the joy of the Gospel that we can proclaim that.

And so we look at Isaiah 28, and we find in this chapter some strange words, perhaps as Ron was reading, you're like, What is this chapter about? What is going on here? And I think the mystery would perhaps only deepen if we heard all the words of this chapter. It's my privilege today to do my best with the spirit to explain this chapter and to try to apply it to our lives so many centuries later. This chapter is ultimately about a difference between an effort at self-salvation in the face of the coming onslaught versus the only secure refuge or salvation there is that provided by Almighty God. Now, this is the beginning of a new section in the book of Isaiah, chapters 28-35, a series of woes one chapter after another, begins with the word woe, this is the first of that string. And the big picture is Isaiah the prophet, in the days of godly King Hezekiah was preparing the Southern Kingdom of Judah for the onslaught of the Assyrians. The Assyrians were coming and they're coming as an instrument of wrath in the hands of Almighty God, they were coming as a judgment for sin. And they were going to sweep away the northern kingdom of Israel called Ephraim in our text today. And they're gonna come after Judah as well. And the reason for that is the sinfulness of the people, because of the sins of the Jews, the Assyrians were coming.

And God through his prophet Isaiah, was calling the people to repent of their sins and to find refuge in God alone, to build their house on the solid rock, the immovable rock, to find refuge in God. And so chapter after chapter begins with the word ‘woe’. But Hezekiah and his counselors, we're gonna see this chapter after chapter, were seeking to find another refuge, another way of escape, specifically, they wanted to reach out to Egypt, another powerful nation and hire them to fight for Judah when the Assyrians came. And so they were being tempted to serve two masters, they'd be divided in their affects and say, "Yeah, there's God, but we're really hoping in Egypt, that Egypt would come and rescue us". And so, chapter after chapter deals with this, beginning with woes, look at this, one 28:1, “Woe to Ephraim”, we'll get to that, 29:1, “Woe to you, Ariel”. Ariel, that's the city of Jerusalem, and he's going to encamp against them and judge them for their sins. Chapter 30 begins, "Woe to the obstinate children. To those who carry out plans that are not mine. Forming an alliance, but not by my Spirit, keeping sin upon sin to those who go down to Egypt Without consulting me and who look for help to Pharaoh's protection and to Egypt's shade for refuge".

And then 31 begins with the word woe as well. Same thing, 31:1, "Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, who rely on horses, who trust in the multitude of their chariots and in the great strength of their horsemen, but they do not look to the Holy One of Israel, and they do not seek help from the Lord". And the last of this series of woes in 33, amazingly, against those that are going to destroy the people of God, those who are gonna destroy Jerusalem, He says, "Woe to you, O destroyer, you who have not been destroyed. Woe to you, O traitor, you who have not been betrayed, when you stop destroying, you will be destroyed, and when you stop betraying you will be betrayed". So there he gives a word of judgment against the very same gentile powers that he's going to use to discipline his own people. It's a string of ‘woes’ one after the other. And we'll look at them each of them in turn. The word ‘woe’ is a word of prophetic warning. Basically, bad times are coming, danger is coming and you need to address it. You need to deal with it. 

So in verses 1-6 the woe is spoken to the Northern Kingdom, the Kingdom of Israel, called Ephraim here. Look at the verses, “Woe to that wreath, the pride of Ephraim's drunkards, to the fading flower, His glorious beauty, set on the head of a fertile valley– to that city, the pride of those laid low by wine. Behold, the Lord has one who is powerful and strong. Like a hailstorm, and the destructive wind like a driving rain and a flooding downpour, he will throw it forcefully to the ground. That wreath, the pride of Ephraim's drunkards will be trampled underfoot. That fading flower, his glorious beauty set on the head of a fertile valley, will be like a ripe fig before harvest– as soon as someone sees it and takes it in his hand, he swallows it. In that day the Lord Almighty will be a glorious crown, a beautiful wreath, for the remnant of his people. He will be a spirit of justice to him who sits in judgment, and a source of strength to those who turn back the battle at the gate".

This is a warning to Ephraim, the Northern Kingdom, but it's spoken to the southern kingdom of Judah, that's where Isaiah was ministering. The northern Kingdom was not listening. They haven't listened for centuries, they're not listening to some Judean prophet. And so basically the people of Judah, the Southern Jews are needing to learn from what's about to happen to the northern Jews, what's about to happen to Ephraim. They're supposed to learn. So this is really a message of warning to Judah, the devastating fall of Ephraim, the Northern Kingdom of Israel. 

And it speaks there of the pride of Ephraim, the beauty of Ephraim. Samaria, their capital city, was set up high on a hill and it looked down over fertile valleys, it was a beautiful thing to behold. And they were very proud of it. And it's called a wreath, set on the head of the nation, so it's the capital city of Samaria, and it's beautiful, and it's fertile, it's on the head of a fertile valley. Again, in verse 3 and 4, speaks of it that way, that wreath, the pride of Ephraim's drunkards will be trampled under foot, that fading flower, his glorious beauty, etcetera. So it's a beautiful thing, it's this beautiful wreath, but it's fading. It was more beautiful before now, it's not so beautiful. Because all men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flower of the field. And the grass withers and the flowers fall, because the breath of the Lord blows on them. Surely the people are grass. The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the Word of our God stands forever.

And so here is Ephraim and at one point they were beautiful, but not so much anymore, they have been laid low, their beauty is fading now, their glory is fading, it's evanescent, it's trend, it's temporary. And why? Because of their wickedness, their sin. Here the focus is on their drunkenness. It's mentioned multiple times in verse 1, those laid low by wine, it speaks of that. That wreath, verse 3, the pride of Ephraim's drunkards. So these were people that were laid low by wine, they were drunkards, And so we see the debauchery of Ephraim, you know the fertility of the land produced abundant harvests. The abundant harvests produced luxury, the luxury led to self-indulgence. The self-indulgence led to immorality and wickedness, and that's brought on the judgment of God. And so we have this warning about drunkenness, Proverbs 20 and verse 1 says, "Wine is a mocker and beer a brawler, whoever's led astray by them is not wise". And again, in Proverbs 23, it says "Do not gaze at wine when it is red, when it sparkles in the cup, when it goes down smoothly in the end, it bites like a snake and poisons like a viper". 

“The abundant harvests produced luxury, the luxury led to self-indulgence. The self-indulgence led to immorality and wickedness, and that's brought on the judgment of God.”

 So we have the fading beauty of what could have been glorious, but no longer was. What could have been for the glory of God, a light shining in a dark place, a city on a hill to be seen by the surrounding region, but instead it was fading, it was debauched. It was wicked. I often think that the great tragedy, the great sorrow of judgment day for all of us is to have a sense of what we could have been if we had been more faithful, but we weren't. What sin robbed from us, if only we had been more faithful, it would be like torture to see some kind of a display, maybe a video of our lives, what could have been if we had only been more faithful or if we hadn't committed that pattern of sin, if we had not been unfaithful in that area, this is the fruitfulness that would have come. How grievous that is.

And so this Northern Kingdom of Israel is about to be deported, and what could have been for the praise of the glory of God, instead was going to be thrown down and crushed, this fading wreath of dead flowers. And so he says in verse 2-4, "Behold the Lord has one who is powerful and strong", he's speaking of the invader, of the Assyrian who's going to come. And it's his servant, the Assyrian is an axe in the hands of God, and God's gonna chop down that beautiful flowering tree. The Lord has one who is powerful and strong like a hailstorm and like a destructive wind, like a driving rain and like a flooding downpour. He, this one, the Assyrian, will throw it forcefully to the ground, that wreath will be trampled underfoot and that fading flower will be swallowed up.

So the Assyrian invasion is coming and there's nothing that the people can do to stop it. And it's the Lord's doing, it's something that's an act of sovereign judgment, that's the key in some ways to understanding the whole chapter. When God is the one who's bringing the judgment, you can only seek refuge in God, any other covenant you make with death or any other arrangement you make will not avail. Running off to Egypt will not help. You have to go deal with God directly. He's the one that's bringing this judgment, but Israel would not. And so the Lord is bringing the Assyrian. Now, the Assyrian thinks he's doing it on his own, he's just adding to his empire, he doesn't think anything about Yahweh, about the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, it doesn't mean anything to the Assyrian, he's just taking over another small country. But he doesn't know who he's dealing with, and we'll get to that story later. But this invasion will be devastating. It will be like a hurricane, it'll be like a plague of locust, it will be like a tidal wave sweeping over the land, all kinds of images are used of the gentile invasions, like a flood of water sweeping away all the crops and flattening houses. Ephraim will be cast forcefully to the ground and adding insult to injury, not only will it be cast to the ground, but then by the hand of the Assyrian, then their boot will trample it, it's just gonna be completely crushed. Gobbled up like an early fig.

Season for figs was somewhere between August and through October, but sometimes in June, there might be a single fig for some reason that was ready to eat. It was an early fig, and they were delicious, especially if you had a taste for figs. I think this is what Jesus was looking for when he saw a fig tree, that had leaves on it, but no figs, looking for one of those early figs, and there was nothing there. And so, Ephraim, this fertile, beautiful, luxurious place will be like an early fig in the hands of the Assyrian invader. As soon as he sees it, he's gonna pluck it and gobble it up, it's gonna be that quick and it won't take long. And Israel will be gone. So it will be with Samaria, plucked by Assyrian, gobbled up. And so we have this fading crown of beauty laid low by wine, laid low by drunkenness, laid low by immorality, by idolatry and wickedness. What could have been glorious, was now fading and ugly. By contrast, though you have the glory of God on the head of the remnant. Look at verses 5 and 6. "In that day, the Lord Almighty will be a glorious crown, a beautiful wreath for the remnant of His people, and He will be a spirit of justice to him who sits in judgment and a source of strength to those who turn back the battle at the gate". 

So Samaria, the capital city, was the crown of the people of Israel, but it was fading and it was made ugly by their drunkenness and by their sin. But by contrast, God has a remnant, a godly remain of people, survivors of the onslaught, who will be for the praise of his glory. And God's glory, God himself will be a diadem on their heads. God himself will crown those people with his own presence and with his glory. And he will transform them, and to the judge who must render judgment, God will be a spirit of justice, and he will enable the judge to render right judgments for the glory of God. And God will be a spirit of strength to the warrior, even to the point of turning back the battle at the gate, and so God will be with his remnant. And he will protect them and they will be his choice possessions, his survivors. The beginning of this prophecy in Isaiah chapter 1:9, Isaiah speaking for the people of God, the Jews, saying, "Unless the Lord Almighty had left us some survivors, a remnant, we would have become like Sodom, we would have been like Gomorrah. And in fact, we're no different than they are, we're just as wicked and just as sinful, but by the sovereign grace of God, he has chosen out for himself a remnant to love him and serve him, and he will crown that remnant with glory, and he will transform them and they will live for him". Again, in Isaiah 10:22, "Though your people, O Israel, be like the sand by the sea, only a remnant will return. So God has chosen his remnant and he will be for them a crown of glory, and that glory will last forever.” So what a contrast here we have a contrast between the fading glory of Ephraim, of human achievement, of human pride versus the eternal glory of God on the head of his remnant, verses 1-6. Now in verses 7-13, Isaiah brings it home to the southern kingdom of Judah.

Now he's talking to his own people, he's talking to them and he's saying, “You have the same problems that the northern kingdom did just a little bit further down the line.” Look at these verses, he's speaking, God speaking, to the people through the prophet Isaiah and through godly prophets, but the people aren't listening. So God has another word to speak to them because they will not listen to the prophetic word. Listen to Verses 7-13, "And these also stagger from wine and reel from beer: Priests and prophets stagger from beer and are befuddled with wine; they reel from beer, they stagger when seeing visions, they stumble when rendering decisions. All the tables are covered with vomit, and there is not a spot without filth." Verse 9, "‘Who is he trying to teach? To whom is he explaining his message? To children weaned from their milk to those just taken from the breast? For it is: do and do, do and do, rule and rule, rule and rule, a little here, a little there.’ Very well then.” By the way, those words just bring a chill to me. “Very well then.” Okay. “With foreign lips and with strange tongues, God will speak to this people, to whom he said, ‘This is the resting place, let the weary rest’; and ‘This is the place of repose’– But they would not listen. So then, the word of the Lord to them will become: ‘Do and do, do and do, rule and rule, rule and rule, a little here, a little there– so that they will go and fall backward; be injured and snared and captured.”

Can I say to you, the key moment in your life every day, is the moment you hear the word of the Lord, and what you do with that? It's a key moment in your life. We've already seen it in the book of Hebrews again and again. Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts. It's a key moment. When God speaks to you through his word, maybe he uses a human intermediary, a preacher, in this case, a prophet speaking the word, or maybe you're just reading the scripture, which you have the privilege to do. When you hear God speak to you, do not harden your heart and certainly don't mock it as these people were doing here, but take it very, very seriously. The priests and the prophets, the false priests and false prophets of the southern kingdom of Judah were themselves given over to drunkenness. They were degraded also through wine. What a shameful thing that is.

The priests should have been speaking God's word. Malachi 2:7 says, "For the lips of the priest ought to preserve knowledge and from his mouth, men should seek instruction because he is the messenger of the Lord Almighty." The prophet should have been the one saying, "Thus says the Lord…” and speaking the true word of God. But it's so bad in verse 8 that the things coming out of their mouth is nothing but vomit, it could be taken metaphorically for their teachings, or it might be literal at the end of their drunken feasts, but it's so bad that there's not a clean place on the table, vomit everywhere. And the fundamental problem is these people were not listening to God as he was speaking, they were mocking it actually. Speaking of Isaiah, “Who is he trying to teach? We're the experts, we're the ones that know God's word very well, and he's speaking a baby message, like we're just children weaned from the breasts.” And then they say this, "Do and do, do and do, rule and rule, rule and rule, little here, little there." Well, that's the best we can do with a rhythmic kind of Hebrew that sounds like... I don't usually pronounce Hebrew, but it sounds like this “Sav lasav sav lasav, kav lakav, kav lakav”. That's literally what the Hebrew says. It's similar to “blah, blah, blah, yada, yada yada.” Okay, that's the 21st century version. That's what they were saying Isaiah was saying, “Oh, here we go. Some more, blah, blah, blah. Yada, yada, yada. Lots of talking.” That's what you get at church week after week, it's going on all around the world. People get up just like me and they talk. They talk God's word. And if the word of God to you is blah, blah, blah, yada, yada, yada, then this passage speaks directly to you. 

And here's how it works, God says, "Very well then, I tried to speak to you through the prophets. I tried to warn you and tell you what was going to come, but you wouldn't listen. So I'm gonna talk to you again, and it's gonna sound kinda like that. Blah, blah, blah. Like that, it's gonna sound like that. I'm gonna speak to you through a foreign language, I'm gonna bring some people to your town, they'll come right to your hometown, and they'll speak a foreign language in your streets, and then the word of the Lord will be to you, do and do, do and do, rule and rule, rule and rule, a little here, a little there. And while you're hearing it, you'll go and fall backward and be injured and snared and captured.” So this is a very key moment for all of us. Fundamentally, here's a thing, God speaks a word of warning, and if we don't listen, then he speaks a word of judgment. So it's like a parent saying to the toddler, to the young person "That stove is hot doesn't look hot, but it is. Don't touch it. Okay? You understand, don't touch." But the child has to find out for him or herself, and so over they go and they touch it, and they learn. You learn by word, or you learn by life. It's so much sweeter to learn by word, friends. It's so much sweeter. Like God said through Moses, "These are not idle words for you, these are your life.” We don't disregard this message, we take it very, very seriously, and we certainly don't mock it. And what's so tragic is that in that prophetic message that Isaiah was giving, he wasn't just speaking judgment, he said, "Judgment's coming, but there is a refuge. There is a place of rest, there is a place where the weary can rest. I will carve out for you in the midst of this God ordained storm of judgment, I will carve out for you a resting place. Here it is." But they would not listen. Is that you? Oh, I pray not. 

 This reminds me very much of what Jesus said when he said, "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you'll find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” [Matthew 11:28-30] Here is the place of rest of Isaiah 28:12, it's, his name is Jesus. There is the place of rest, there's the place of repose. But they would not listen, are the next words, how tragic is that? The gospel is preached, the place of refuge is clearly identified, but the people just won't listen. Oh, is that you? I pray not. I pray that you're running to God's ordained place of refuge, because the storm is coming. Storm of judgment is coming, and Jesus is the refuge.

But these people sought to find their own refuge, they wouldn't listen to God's place of refuge, so they set out for themselves a different refuge, they sought to save themselves. So look at this in verses 14-15, it says, "Therefore, hear the word of the Lord, you scoffers who rule these people in Jerusalem, you boast, we have entered into a covenant with death, with the grave we have made an agreement. When the overwhelming scourge sweeps by, it cannot touch us. For we have made a lie our refuge and falsehood our hiding place." Well, he's speaking directly to the political leaders of Judah, and I think as you keep reading the chapters, you find out what their covenant of death is, they made a separate arrangement for this coming judgment, they didn't deny it was coming, they really thought the Assyrians were going to come, but they thought that they could deal with it by putting silver and gold on the backs of camels and donkeys and sending the money down to Egypt and hiring an army.

We'll get to that in due time, I won't talk about it fully today, but that's what it means why we have made a covenant with death. “We've made some arrangements. Okay? Death's coming. I know, I know, but we've made some arrangements. We're gonna be just fine.” So I've made some kind of a separate piece, but Isaiah shreds this thing completely, the refuge, he calls it a lie, and their hiding place is a falsehood. And he says, “God's judgment is gonna sweep it away, hail will sweep away your refuge, the lie, and water will overflow your hiding place. Your covenant with death will be annulled, your agreement with the grave will not stand, and when the overwhelming scourge sweeps by, you will be beaten down by it, as often as it comes, it will carry you away. Morning after morning, by day and by night, it will sweep through. The understanding of this message will bring sheer terror, the bed is too short to stretch out on, and the blanket too narrow to wrap around you.” Okay, what God is saying here is your separate deal will not stand up, it will not save you, your covenant with death will be annulled, your arrangement with the Egyptians to come rescue you from Assyria will not work. And when this judgment comes, you're gonna get swept away in it, you're going to get crushed by it. 

And yet in the middle of all that, God shows again a refuge, a safe place, and this is the key verse in the whole chapter. Look at verse 16, Isaiah 28:16-17. So this is what the Sovereign Lord says, "Behold, I lay a stone in Zion, a tested stone, a precious cornerstone for a sure foundation, and the one who trusts will never be dismayed." Verse 17, "I will make justice the measuring line and righteousness the plumb line." Now, I love the word "behold.", the NIV translators do not, they give us "see." Friends, “see” and “behold” are not equal. Amen. Talk to me later. Alright, if you agree, that's fine. I just like “behold”. Well, they're saying, "We don't say behold anymore." Well, let's save behold for special, awesome things that God does. How about that? So when God does something special and awesome say, "Behold…" something like that. It's not a word we use every day. Let's save it for when God's doing something awesome. And God does lots of "behold" things in Isaiah. But this is the greatest of them all, friends. This is, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.” That's what this “behold” is about. “Behold, a rock set in Zion on which you can build your whole eternity, you can build your house here and it will not move, it's a tested and sure precious cornerstone, and behold, I'm laying it there in Zion for you. And nothing will sweep it away.”

Everything man-made, all the man-made refuges will be swept away by this coming judgment. But the stone that God lays in Zion is a tested stone. It's tested, it's been proven. And it will work. It's a precious stone. It's valuable and precious, infinitely precious. It's a cornerstone, it's the base stone on which everything else finds its orientation, and it's a sure foundation stone, everything is built on this stone. And I keep saying "this stone," but it just says, “The one who trusts in him will not be put to shame.” So we know that Isaiah was talking about a man, he was talking about Jesus. Jesus is the tested stone, the precious cornerstone for the sure foundation. And, “Whoever trusts in him, whoever believes in him will not be in haste” is one of the translations. That's probably the simplest coming from the Hebrew. “I don't know what that means, all I can do is guess like a chicken with the head cut off, running around like a maniac, having no answer to the coming judgment, frazzled, annoyed, irritated, frantic”, as opposed to this is the place of rest, this is the place where the weary can rest, this is the refuge place where if you're in there, you're at piece, you're safe, you're secure. But if you have made a lie your refuge, then when it starts getting swept away, you'll be like that. You'll run around in haste. You'll run around like a maniac. 

Three times in the New Testament, this text is quoted in reference to Jesus, three times. This is Jesus. New Testament writers tell us it is. Peter speaks of Jesus as a living stone rejected by men, but chosen by God and precious to him. And says that we're like him, we Christians are like him, we're like living stones built into a royal, royal priesthood. A structure and the priesthood alike. For in Scripture, it says, 1 Peter 2:6-8, "Behold, I lay a stone in Zion, a chosen and precious cornerstone, and the one who trusts in Him will never be put to shame." It says. Now to you who believe the stone is precious, but to those who do not believe, the stone the builders rejected has become the capstone, that's Psalm 118. And a stone that causes men to stumble and a rock that makes them fall, that's Isaiah 8. So generally Isaiah 28:16 is quoted with Psalm 118, and Isaiah 8 brought in with the stone image, so we have the precious cornerstone set, and then we have the bad reaction of Jewish unbelievers do that stone, the builders reject him and people stumble over him. “They stumble because they disobey the message, which is also what they were destined for”, Peter says.

Paul quotes it twice in Romans, in Romans 9, and then again in Romans 10. Speaking of the Gentile believers, that's us. Who did not pursue righteousness have obtained it a righteousness that is by faith. But Israel, which pursued a law of righteousness has not attained it, why not? Because they pursued it not by faith, but as if it were by works, they stumbled over the stumbling stone. As it is written, "Behold, I lay in Zion a stone.", that's Isaiah 28. "That causes men to stumble.", that's Isaiah 8. So, Paul puts them together, “and a rock that makes them fall, and the one who trusts in him will never be put to shame”, he goes back to Isaiah 28 again. In Paul's mind, that Jesus is the precious stone set in Zion, and that all we have to do is trust in him and we will never be put to shame. It’s immediately connected with the rejection of Jesus by his own people, the builders rejected him, but he's become the cornerstone, and he is the rock of stumbling and they stumble because they can't deal with the fact that God's messiah would be dead on a cross. They don't understand why it had to happen. And that their own righteousness is not enough. They're pursuing their own righteousness, but they couldn't find it in the cross, and they hated that message. And they turned from it. 

He does the same thing in Romans 10, quoting this same text. Sweet verses. And there he says, "If you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord’, and if you believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with the heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with the mouth that you confess and are saved. As the Scripture says, ‘Anyone who trusts in Him will never be put to shame’” that's Isaiah 28. “For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile. The same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for ‘Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’” Oh, how sweet are those words, “Never be put to shame.” Not be ashamed now, you'll not be ashamed for the rest of your life, you'll not be ashamed in death, you'll not be ashamed on judgment day, and you'll not be ashamed for all eternity, and why? Because you're so righteous? Not at all, but because all of your shame and your wickedness and your sin were put on Jesus, that solid rock, and he shed his blood for you, and you are clean now and will be forever.

So are you trusting in him so that you will not be put to shame? Because if you're not trusting in Him, you will be put to shame. Your refuge will be swept away. Death is surely coming our way. Hebrews 9:27 says, "Man is destined to die once and after that to face judgment." Ecclesiastes 7:2 says, "Death is the destiny of every man." As death's coming. The overwhelming scourge of Isaiah 28 is coming our way. What is your refuge? That's the question of the text. Are people seeking a kind of a separate covenant with death? Make a deal with death. There are different ways to do that. People may be aware of death, may fear it in some way, aware of the death threat, they've seen others die, and so they want to, as the psychologist tell us, come to terms with death, will come to terms. Us and death will sit down at the negotiating table and we'll come to terms. We'll make an agreement. Alright? A covenant ­­­– death and I.

I mean there are a lot of different ways to do this. An atheist can do it by just facing the facts, square on, as they see it from their evolutionary slant. Okay? Just face the facts square on. Like Australian atheist Keith Cornish, quoting him, I hope he doesn't mind me quoting him, he's on the internet, so I think it's probably okay. He says this, "The simple fact is that all life forms end in death, and the elements of which they are composed return to the air and to the earth to be taken up and recycled in some new organism. This natural process is universal and is beyond dispute, what is challenged by atheists and free thinkers is the claim made by purveyors of religion," that's me. "Purveyors of religion, that humans alone of all living forms have a soul or a spirit, which survives death and carries the essential characteristics of the person to some supernatural existence in a supernatural realm." That's denied by Atheist and free thinkers. He continues. "Anyone weighing the evidence has no trouble in discarding the notion of the everlasting soul and accepting that death is the natural end to every human life. By accepting this, by accepting that life is only for a finite period short or long, the atheist is confronted by the question of how best to spend the available time, and therefore, if suitably informed, will most likely spend the time worthy of a human person." 

How optimistic is that? We can debate that optimism and other time. But he's confident that if the atheist could just manfully or woman-fully face death, you will be able to live a good life and then become a worm, a part of worm anyway, or a plant or whatever as your elements breakdown, and then you're gone. So face facts and live a good life. That, friends, sounds like, I'm thinking, a covenant with death. Come to terms with it, understand it and don't fear it. And he goes on, “It would be difficult to imagine a more useless waste of time than that spent in the worship of an imaginary God or preparing for a non-existent everlasting life in some mythical supernatural realm of eternal bliss.” You, friends, according to him, are all wasting your time here today, listening to me talk about some mythical supernatural realm and the existence of the soul. So it's a Covenant, death, I have no fear of death because death is natural, it's what happens to every living organism, I don't fear it. 

There are other covenants of death you can make, or seek anyway. Ponce de Leon was looking for the fountain of youth. He never found it, but he's looking for, according, if you drink the waters of youth,you can return to your youth and death can be at least deferred, I guess. So he discovered Florida, looking for the fountain of youth. There are actually a number of Ponce de Leon medical centers down in Florida, believe it or not. I ran out of time on research, maybe they do plastic surgery, I'm not sure what they do to defer aging. But at any rate, there is an effort to avoid death to make a covenant with death to defer it. We Americans are in love with youth, and we esteem it and we worship it to some degree. 

Other religions have their own version of what I think Isaiah 28 would call a covenant with death. Friends, this is my world view, anything that's not Christianity is a false religion. False religions come from Satan. Satan tries to get people to make covenants with death. Generally, the recipe is: use your good works to pay for your sins and then heaven will be open to you. Could be an Islamic version of those good works, could be a Buddhist or Hindu version of the good works. Could even be a nominal Christian version of the good works. All of those things, covenant of death.

Practically, people knowing that death is coming, seek to amuse themselves. The word literally means to not think about it. To divert themselves with hobbies, all of these things stratagems. Can I give you a better answer? Find the true refuge from this coming onslaught. Don't deny that the onslaught's coming, it's coming. It is appointed to each one of us to die once, and after that to face judgment. It's coming. And it will be like a storm. There is a refuge, and his name is Jesus. If you build all of your hopes on Christ, you will survive the onslaught. That's what this text is saying. Final warning comes in verses 21-22, “The Lord will rise up as he did at mount Perazim, he will rouse himself as in the Valley of Gibeon – to do his work, his strange work and perform his task, his alien task. Now stop your mocking, or your chains will become heavier; the Lord, the Lord Almighty has told me of the destruction decreed against this whole land.” So it's a final warning saying, the storm is coming, the destruction is coming, God has decreed it. It is coming. And nothing will stop it, stop mocking the word, or it's gonna get even worse for you. And he says, “The Lord will rouse himself up back as he did at Mount Perazim in the valley of Gibeon.” Those were times when God delivered the Jews from their enemies, from the Philistines through David. But this time God's gonna rouse himself up and fight, but he's not gonna be fighting for the Jews; he's gonna be fighting against them. And therefore it calls it his work, his strange work and his task, his alien task, he's going to be behaving in a way that seems strange to his nature. Alien to his nature, and it'll be confusing to people who don't know what's going on. Now, the chapter ends with a parable of the farmer, which I'm not gonna go into it all today, I've reserved it for next time that I preach. So I'll just defer all comments about that to next week.

By application. Simply, I've already applied it to you: Come to Christ, trust in Him, build your life on the solid rock that God has established, it's the sure foundation. The storm is coming, it's coming. Both houses in the Sermon on the Mount were tested by the rains coming down, and the streams, rising and the wind, blowing and beating, they were both tested. The storm is coming. Death is coming, Judgment Day is coming. And there are two images of Christ in our text. And there are two invitations right in those images. The first image in verse 12, Jesus is the resting place. Let the weary repose. There's the invitation. Verse 16, this is the solid rock. Anyone who trusts in him will not be put to shame. So trust in him, come to Christ, that's the first and greatest application of this. Can I just urge? Don't leave this place unconverted. Don't walk out of this door and take your chances.

The text says, your covenant with death will be swept away, it will not work. Flee to Christ. But there are other applications in the text, and I just wanna say a few things. First, let's understand as Americans the danger of luxurious success. The Ephraimites, those that lived in Samaria, they were surrounded by some really fertile land. Really, really fertile land and the crops were good and the living was easy and comfortable, and there was luxury, and there was sin, there was indulgence, self-indulgence and corruption. It's not a bad thing to have wealth, it's not a bad thing to have land that produces abundant crops, that's not a bad thing, it's a good thing. But 1 Timothy 6 says,

Secondly, understand the dangers of drunkenness, it speaks about those laid low by wine, they're staggered, staggering with wine and tables covered with vomit. I did not say a specific word against wine itself. Some would go that far. And here's the thing, as with so many things in teaching, you've got a safe center zone and you've got ditches on either side, and frequently those ditches have these names, legalism and license. This chapter is a warning against license. Others would be a warning against legalism, but in a chapter in which there's a warning against license, we must preach that way. And there's a clear warning here of the devastation of drunkenness. Do not take your license, saying Jesus drank wine which he did, and Jesus made wine for other people to drink, which he did, to be a license to over-indulge and corrupt your life. Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit. So it's a clear warning there, a slippery slope and the danger of alcoholic beverages without turning to the other danger of legalism and saying that anything for men, it is intrinsically wicked, which puts Jesus in a very bad way.

Third, application, respect the prophetic, the preached word. Respect the word of God. Respect the Bible, don't mock it. These people mocked the word, and they made fun of it. God has two ways of speaking. I would say this, God is bilingual to the human race. They're over 5,000 languages. You guys, Drew and Emily Maust... How many there are? I don't know what Wilckliffe is saying. God speaks them all. He's fluent in all of them, perfectly. I remember my Japanese language instructor being surprised when I said that to her. I said, Do you know that God speaks Japanese better than any Japanese person? She was surprised by that. She said, I think it's probably true. No, it's definitely true. Not probably. God speaks every language. He speaks right to the heart. He speaks heart languages, but essentially, he speaks two languages bilingual to the human race. He speaks by the written word or he speaks by the word of his judgments. And if you don't listen to the warning, you get the judgments. You get, life. You get it acted out in life, if your parents tell you don't touch the hot stove, you might get burned, if you then touch the stove, you're going to get burned. And so when the word of God warns you, against, certain things and you think that you're immune and you go ahead and do it, God will speak to you a second way. 

So, let's say, like young people, there're warnings in the Bible about sex, about fornication. You may think you're exempt, you're not. God is giving you clear warnings against sexual immorality, you may think you're exempt, but it says, "Can you scoop coals into your lap and not get burned?" If you don't listen to the word of warning, then you get spoken to in the second language. And that's why I said it brings me chills when it says there, "Very well then, very well then." And God is patient, he doesn't immediately speak that second language, the language of judgment. He is patient, but he's patient for you to hear his word and bring your life through repentance to him. So don't mock the word. God has told us who he esteems, this is the one I esteem, the one who is humble and contrite, and who trembles at my word, not the one who mocks it like these people did in this chapter. 

And forth, your covenant with death. You know what your covenant with death is? I hope it's the new covenant, amen? I hope it's the New Covenant in Jesus's blood. I hope that. I hope that your only trust is in the blood of Jesus. And I think the best hymn that I could sing, but I'm not gonna sing it. And you'll all thank me for that. Actually, I have an okay voice, but I don't start on the right pitch, I start too high, or too low. Ask the members or our home fellowship, alright? Way up high, giving the ladies a chance to sing solos. “My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus blood and righteousness. I dare not trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus name. On Christ, the solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand.” Say it again. All other ground is sinking sand. So when you face trials in your life, short-term trials, financial, medical, relational, whatever, those are, just practice for the big trial coming, death, judgment etcetera. In those smaller trials, trust in Jesus the way you trust him for the big one. Okay? Like this, we're having financial troubles, having trouble making ends meet financially, the same God who gave his son, the same Jesus who shed his blood. He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all. He will also enable us to handle this financial struggle. Link the two. The blood of Jesus to the storm that you see coming in your life.

And finally understand that God's judgment and wrath are his strange work. It's not his homebase. God is love, God is mercy, he is tenderness. He will do his work, his strange work, he will perform his task, his alien task, and he'll do it to clean up the universe of the toxic filth of sin, he'll do it. Everything that causes sin and all those who do evil will be weeded out of his kingdom. But it's his strange work. It's not homebase. God, is love, he is mercy, he is tenderness. Flee to him and trust in him. Close with me in prayer.

Father, we thank you for the word of God. We thank you for Isaiah 28 and the things we have to learn from it. And I pray, oh Lord, that we would not make some separate covenant with death or some arrangement. I pray instead, we would build our lives entirely on the solid rock, Jesus Christ in whose name we pray. Amen.

Andy Davis preaches a verse by verse expository sermon on Isaiah 27:1-13. The main subject of the sermon is how God defends and carefully watches of his people though they are sinful.

All over the world in every continent there are myths and legends and stories about dragons. That was a shock, wasn't it? Dragons! It's true. In China, for example, the dragon was long the symbol of the emperor of China and of the nation itself, the fierce, winged, reptile fire-breathing dragon. A three-headed dragon is on the coat of arms of the city of Moscow in Russia, and also on the national flag of Wales. And in many cultures, there are stories about the conquest of dragons by heroes that go forth to warfare against them. All of us were encouraged... What verb do you wanna put in here? Afflicted with Beowulf when you were in high school, and read that story of the conquest of that dragon. Others have voluntarily chosen to read The Hobbit, which is Bilbo Baggins struggle against Smaug, the fire-breathing dragon.

Probably the most famous abiding story is that of Saint George, who was historically, as far as we know, a third century believer in Christ, a Roman soldier, who was martyred in the end by the Roman Emperor, for his faith in Christ. But many legends around him concerning his conquest of a fire-breathing dragon. There are a lot of different versions of the story of Saint George and the dragon. He comes to a pagan town in which there is a terrifying dragon nearby that's guarding the fresh water supply. And constantly they're needing to distract this dragon with some kind of sacrifices, frequently young women from the community, so that the dragon is moved off and they can go and get the water they need to survive. And they're finally down to the princess, the daughter of the King, and Saint George comes into this situation and decides to go forth and fight the dragon. And there are a lot of stories about how the battle goes and his lance is shattered into a thousand pieces, and inevitably in these conquests of dragon stories, there's some weak spot, like under the wing of the dragon that the conquerer is able to find, and either shoot an arrow into or shove a sword into and kill the dragon.

Well, those are all myths and legends, and they go back even before the time that Isaiah wrote his prophecy. If you were to have a King James version of Isaiah 27:1, you would see at the end of the verse the word “dragon”. And so we come immediately to the story of a battle. In this case, however, the hero is the Lord. The Lord is going to fight Leviathan, and if you look at verse 1, it says, "In that day, the Lord will punish with his sword, his fierce, great and powerful sword, Leviathan, the gliding serpent, Leviathan, the coiling serpent, he will slay," the NIV gives us, "the monster of the sea." King James will give us "the dragon of the sea." 

This is speaking of the coming day of the Lord, and this phrase is repeated again and again in this chapter, in that day, or in that day, in those days, in a day in the future these following things will happen. So we come again to the concept of the day of the Lord, and here we have an epic battle, a hero struggle between the Lord and this monster, this Leviathan. Now who is Leviathan? How are we to understand this Leviathan? In my opinion, the simple answer is that these are the enemies, or this is the enemy of the people of God. And I speak in this language because, as I read history, as I read the scriptures, the ultimate enemy of the people of God is Satan. And he mobilizes human beings, his servants, sons of the devil, who go forth and battle against or war against the people of God, to kill them or make their lives miserable in some way. And so we have really a complex two-fold answer to the question, who is Leviathan?

Leviathan is both a pagan empire that hates the people of God, the Jews in the Old Testament, and Satan who empowers them and directs them in hatred against God's people. And so Leviathan is described in three ways here. Leviathan, the gliding serpent; Leviathan, the coiling serpent, the monster or the dragon of the sea. So the images of a mighty sea serpent, a powerful sea serpent in the sea, the ocean is pictured here as something dangerous and unknown. You can only see the surface, you don't know what's going on down below and what kind of devastating beast there might be, some creature that might swim up from below and devour you. I remember well the summer of 1976 when Jaws came out. And I was forbidden by my parents from watching the movie, but I knew the story, and I'd seen enough clips, I guess on TV or whatever, and I was well aware of the effect that this movie was having on beachgoers.

Well, we didn't go to the beach, we actually went to Lake Winnipesaukee in New Hampshire, and I was convinced the great white shark was going to be devouring me. And it didn't matter what biology lessons my parents were going to give me about fresh water and salt water and all that. I was convinced as I was swimming and couldn't see down below that at any moment I was going to get devoured, it was going to swim up from down below. But these fears have been around for an awfully long time. Think about Christopher Columbus as he sailed west in three ships with sailors who all of them to a man were terrified of monsters of the sea. Frequently there would be charts that would show the edge of the world and beyond, it would say, "Here be dragons." And so there was a terror, a fear of the unknown. 

In the Book of Daniel, the sea represents the roiling, churning nations, the mass of the gentile nations with great unknown and it cannot be controlled and it's unpredictable. And Daniel 7 pictures four beasts, one after the other, coming up out of the ocean, out of the sea to oppress the people of God, the Jews. Revelation 7 picks up on this exact same image. And it pictures a dragon standing by the sea and calling forth out of the sea, a beast. And this beast from the sea will be, in some sense, a terrifying world leader who will organize his people or the peoples of the world against the people of God, many call this the anti-Christ. So there is biblical warrant here for seeing Leviathan as a symbol for both the wicked empires themselves, the Assyrian Empire, the Babylonian Empire, the Medo-Persian empire, the Greeks, the Romans, and the dragon behind them, Satan, who calls them forth up out of the sea to do his bidding. And the verse says that God, the Lord will punish Leviathan and slay the monster or the dragon of the deep.

So God is going to fight and he will win. Some say this is an ancient Babylonian myth that Isaiah is using here. The myth of Marduk and Tiamat, I'm not gonna go into details about that. It's not, is my answer, simply. That talks about how, in the Enûma Eliš, that's how, in the Babylonian mythology, that's how the world got created, but this is a battle yet to come. It's a battle yet in the future, in that day. So the first true fulfillment is God's conquest in amazing ways of the pagan, the gentile armies that are gonna come against his people. He's going to dismember them. He's going to sever them, limb from limb, head from tail. But then in the end, he's going to sever the whole thing. He's going to destroy Satan, and all of Satan's people in the end. And so here's a connection to chapter 26, if you were to look at the end of 26, there it describes the end of the world and the earth disclosing the blood shed on it, and all of the suffering of God's people and how God will establish righteousness in the end. And so this is a conquest that the Lord does, both in time in redemptive history, and at the end of the world.

If you look back in Israel's history, before Isaiah, the Red Sea crossing, the same kind of language is used concerning the Red Sea crossing in Psalm 74:13-14, there, Pharaoh's army is defeated by the splitting apart of the Red Sea. And God splits apart the Red Sea and makes a path through the sea for his people to escape. And the psalmist in Psalm 74 says, "It was you who split open the sea by your power; you broke the heads of the monster in the waters." You see, just by splitting apart the sea, God was severing Leviathan. He was severing or dismembering this monster of the sea. Verse 14 in Psalm 74, "It was you who crushed the heads of Leviathan and gave him his food to the creatures of the desert." Now, in the end, the dragon language is established in Revelation chapter 12. And you don't have to turn there, but you can look another time. In Revelation 12, depicts a warfare going on in the heavens between Michael, the archangel, and Satan. And Satan's not strong enough, and he is thrown down to the earth that, it says in Revelation 12, "Now and the great dragon was hurled down, that ancient serpent called the devil or Satan."

So there you've got dragon, serpent, devil, Satan, in case you had any doubt who we were talking about. This dragon was thrown down, the one who leads the whole world astray. But later in Revelation 12, he opens his mouth, the dragon does, and spews forth a river that's supposed to kind of inundate and overtake the people of God. And the earth opens up its mouth and swallows this river. And so again, I think this supports the approach I'm taking, that Leviathan is both the dragon who is Satan, and the river of armies that come forth to slaughter the people of God. And in the end, God's gonna win, Amen? That's what the sermon said. If you don't understand the Book of Revelation, simply, it's this: God wins. So I like that. All the enemies that are against the people of God, God wins in the end. 

But the ultimate victory against this dragon is in Revelation 20:10, "The devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. And they will be tormented day and night forever and ever." That is the end of Leviathan, right there. So that's who Leviathan is. What then is the sword of the Lord? This is the sword of the Lord that's going to dismember Leviathan, that's gonna cut it apart, limb from limb. Three adjectives used to describe it here, his sword is fierce, great and powerful sword in the NIV. Hard, some translations give it, it's a hard sword. In other words, it battles but no detriment to the sword, no notches in it. It doesn't break, it doesn't get dull ever. It's hard, it's strong, it's mighty, it has power, and it never changes.

Well, we know from many other passages what the sword of the Lord is, don't you know? It says that we are to take up the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. Or in Hebrews 4:12, "The Word of God is living and active, sharper than any double-edged sword," etcetera. And so the sword of the Lord is his mighty word. By simply speaking the word, he dismembers Leviathan. Isn't that awesome? And how awesome is that picture that God, all he has to do is simply give the word and Leviathan will be dismembered. And so there is an already in a not yet aspect to this, Isaiah 27:1. In some sense, we'll talk more about this toward the end of the sermon, Leviathan has been dismembered. He has been slain and in some sense, he is being slain right now, and in some sense, he will be slain yet to come. So he didn't, God didn't just want one little quick victory over Leviathan, he wants a long drawn out dismemberment. He kind of wants to torture Leviathan and kind of sever him in many different ways. And that's what we have here. Well, the result of this, in verses 2 through 6, is a vineyard that fills the whole world with fruit. 

Basically, let me give you just an outline right now of the whole chapter, so you can understand what's going on. We have the battle between the Lord and Leviathan in verse 1, and God wins and dismembers Leviathan. You have in verses 2 through 6, a fruitful vineyard, Jacob, that fills the whole world with fruit. You have in verses 7 through 11, Jacob's punishment or the chastening of the people of God for their sins, but not as far as God could have done. He chastens them to purify them so that they get rid of the idols in their lives and crush the Asherah poles and incense altars and make them like chalk stones. He crushes their idols so that they can be pure. They get judged but not like the nations, the pagan nations, that get judged worse. And so God's people are disciplined and purged of their sins. And then in the end, versus 12 and 13, there's a trumpet call that goes out around the world, recalling the elect of God together, assembling to worship Him eternally.So that's the whole chapter. Isn't that a marvelous story?

So, I think you know, in the end I'm gonna get to preach the Gospel from this chapter. You have a sense of that? Do you have an instinct? We're gonna, in the end, talk about Jesus from this chapter. How could it not be? But now we're in verses 2 through 6, and we have this, as a result of the slaying of Leviathan, you have this marvelous fruitful vineyard. Look at verses 2 through 6. "In that day," again that phrase repeated, “In that day­­­­– ‘Sing about a fruitful vineyard: I, the Lord, watch over it; I water it continually. I guard it day and night so that no one may harm it. I am not angry. If only there were briars and thorns confronting me! I would march against them in battle. I would set them all on fire, or else let them come to me for refuge; let them make peace with me, yes, let them make peace with me.’ In days to come, Jacob will take root, and Israel will bud and blossom and fill all the world with fruit.”

So here we have a song about a fruitful vineyard. And it happens in that day, again in the day of the Lord, when God moves out and acts powerfully, in history, when God gets going and does stuff, the results here is a fruitful vineyard. The day of the Lord brings not just judgment, but fruitfulness. The day of the Lord looks ahead to the end of the world. And here we have, for the second time in Isaiah, a song about a vineyard, but a very different one this time. You could take and flip back if you want to Isaiah 5, or you can just listen, but some of you will wanna look back at Isaiah 5, and here we have, in Isaiah 5, the first song about a vineyard. But the problem with that vineyard is it wasn't fruitful. Nothing good came from that vineyard. It produced only bad grapes.

So if you look at that song in Isaiah 5:1-7, there Isaiah sings this song, he said, "I will sing for the one I love," that's the Lord. "I will sing for the one I love a song about his vineyard: My loved one had a vineyard on a fertile hillside. He dug it up and cleared it of stones and planted it with the choicest vines. He built a watch tower in it and cut out a winepress as well. Then he looked for a crop of good grapes, but it yielded only bad fruit. ‘Now you dwellers in Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard. What more could have been done for my vineyard than I have done for it? When I look for good grapes, why did it yield only bad? Now, I will tell you what I'm going to do to my vineyard: I will take away its hedge, and it will be destroyed; I'll break down its wall and it will be trampled. I will make it a wasteland, neither pruned nor cultivated, and briars and thorns will grow there. I will command the clouds not to rain on it.’" Interpretation in verse 7, "The vineyard of the Lord Almighty is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are the garden of his delight. And he looked for justice, but saw bloodshed; he looked for righteousness, but heard cries of distress."

Now, that was the first song about the vineyard, and it's a bad song. It's a tragic song, it's a tragedy. The problem there with Judah and Jerusalem is that God was looking for fruitfulness and got nothing but bad grapes. And so then God says, in Isaiah 5, he's going to judge his vineyard by taking away its wall of protection, and it's gonna get trampled. If you don't know what that's talking about, then you haven't read a lot of Isaiah. You know exactly what's gonna happen. He's going to literally break down the wall of Jerusalem and the invaders are gonna come in and trample it. He's gonna take away its wall or its hedge of protection, and the invading armies are going to trample it. And he's gonna command the clouds not to rain on it. And this is the avenues of grace, the richness of God's grace, the rain is God's provision for his people. Let's say through the ministry of the word how the prophets come to speak God's word, but he says there's gonna be a famine of the word of the Lord, they're not gonna hear it. I'm gonna shut down the prophets. There won't be any and there won't be any words from the Lord about it.

And in the end, you get briars and thorns and again that goes back to Genesis 3, that's curse language, that the land will be cursed with thorns. Well, that's Isaiah 5, go back to Isaiah 27. I like a happier song, don't you, than a sad one? I mean there's a place in God's providence for sad songs and happy songs. This one's a happy song about the vineyard. So we return to the same thing but this time it's a very different outcome. Here in verse 3, I'm in Isaiah 27 now, "The Lord waters it continually" do you see that? It's continually provided for, constant outpouring of power and grace for fruitfulness. Every moment this vineyard gets everything it needs to be maximally fruitful, and in verse 3, "I the LORD watch over it continually and will not allow anyone to trample it or harm it." Isn't that fantastic? So everything's different here in Isaiah 27 than in Isaiah 5. And he says he's going to guard it and watch over it day and night, nothing can harm it. He who watches over you will not slumber. He who guards you will neither slumber nor sleep, Psalm 121. And he says, his wrath is gone. Look at verse 4, NIV very meek there, “I am not angry.” I like ESV better, “I have no wrath, my wrath is gone.”

In the past, God was enraged at Israel's sinfulness. He had an active wrath against them, he unleashed his judgments and wiped out all but the remnant, now his wrath is completely gone. He's not angry anymore. And so later in Isaiah's prophecy, he will say this to his prophet, he speaks to his prophet in Isaiah 40, and he gives him direct orders, "Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin is atoned for, that she has received from the Lord's hand double for all her sins.” The provision for their sins is ample and sufficient. And, in verse 4, God apparently searches for enemies but doesn't find any. You get the sense of some like black belt karate expert, who's got like all these weapons and he's just looking for someone to fight. Now that's a bad attitude. But here God is saying, "I wish there were someone I could fight to show my zeal for my people, there are no enemies left. I wish that there were briars and thorns confronting me. I wish there were was some evidence of curse around me because then I would take it on and destroy it too."

God is so zealous to protect his people at this point. He's almost taunting wickedness and enemies to come and take him on and say, "We'll let's see what will happen there." The Lord is a mighty warrior. And he's saying, "Oh you wanna take me on then fight me. And then you'll see my zeal for my people." And he will just burn up any briars and thorns that would be confronting him. Or he actually says at that point, "I have a better idea, suppose the briars and thorns just come and make peace with me instead," he actually says it twice, "Yes let them make peace with me." It's a terrifying thing for the Lord to be your enemy, but what a delightful thing for him to be your Savior.

At one time, we were enemies in our minds, as demonstrated by our evil behavior. At one time, we were God's enemies. For if when we were God's enemies we were reconciled to him through the death of his son how much more, having been reconciled shall we be saved by his life? So God says, "Why don't you come and grab hold of me for refuge." The image is this Old Testament image like in I Kings, when Solomon takes the throne, remember how Adonijah almost got the throne but didn't quite make it, and God chose Solomon instead, and Adonijah at this point, I wouldn't sell him life insurance. It's a bad, bad place to be. But God granted him some measure of grace. He had run into the tabernacle and taken hold of the horns of the altar, I Kings 1:50. And then in I Kings 2, Joab did the same thing. He went in and took hold of the altar, it's a sense of running for refuge. And that's the picture we have here in Isaiah, 27. “Instead of running away from me, why don't you turn and run to me, and throw yourself on my mercy, and I will show you mercy. Everyone who calls in the name of the Lord will be saved. So let them make peace with me that's a better idea, let them find refuge in me.”

For it happened to Saul of Tarsus, breathing out murderous threats against the Lord's disciples, the Lord threatened him with instant destruction, this brilliant light shining around him, but he's calling him instead to salvation. He deserved to die. He knew it, he deserved to die because he was a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man. But God showed mercy to him. And so God is ready to show mercy to his enemies. So he says, "Let them make peace with me." And the result of this verse 6 is universal fruitfulness for the people of God. "In days to come, Jacob will take root and Israel will bud and blossom and fill all the world with fruit.” Once Leviathan is slaughtered and the Lord is directly protecting his vineyard day and night and watering it continually, it's going to fill the whole world with fruitfulness. It's gonna be stunningly fruitful. And notice the language it's Jacob here. That's all of God's people not just the northern kingdom, or the southern kingdom, the split apart people of God. No this is Jacob. These are the people of God, and Israel. And they're going to take root, and they're going to have a fantastic root system, and they're going to draw nourishing sap from that root system. And they're going to bud and flourish, that means they're going to be very, very healthy, the people of God. And as a result, they're going to fill all the world with fruit.

Friends, this can be nothing less than the fulfillment of the promise made to Abram in Genesis chapter 12 when he said in verse 3, "I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse, and all peoples on earth will be blessed because of you." Like Jesus said to the Samaritan woman, "Salvation is from the Jews." And so, God would choose a remnant of his people, and He would make them fruitful worldwide, and there would be a worldwide harvest of fruitfulness for Jacob and Israel. And at last, the Lord will have what he intended from the beginning, his people will be fruitful for all eternity.

Now, in verses 7-11 we have the people punished. So we in effect we have to go back a bit and then we see what produces this. Again let's keep in mind when Isaiah lived and when he made this prophecy. The Assyrians hadn't come yet, the Babylonian certainly hadn't come yet. These two exiles are still in the future. And when the people go through it, they're going to be confused, they're going to be tempted to be confused, "Has God forsaken us? Are we still the people of God?" And so he is very clear and honest about this. The people of God are about to go through a very hard time. And that's what verses 7-11 are describing. And yet it's only by measure, the hard time is going to be carefully measured out to produce God's end, and God's end is to purify them of their idols. So look at verses 7-11, "Has the Lord struck her," that's Israel, I think, or Jerusalem, "Has the Lord struck her as he struck down those who struck her? Has she been killed as those were killed who killed her? By warfare and exile you contend with her­­– with his fierce blast he drives her out, as on the day the east wind blows. By this then will Jacob's guilt be atoned for, and this will be the full fruitage of the removal of his sin: When he makes all the altar stones to be like chalk stones crushed to pieces, no Asherah poles or incense altars will be left standing. The fortified city stands desolate, an abandoned settlement forsaken like the desert; there the calves graze; there they lie down; and they strip its branches bare. When its twigs are dry, and they're broken off and women come and make fires with them. For this is a people without understanding, and so their maker has no compassion on them, and their Creator shows them no favor."

So this is going back and explaining what's going to happen before, before the fruitfulness of Jacob in order to clear out the idolatry and the wickedness. So this is a difficult section. But Israel's about to be seriously stricken by God, smashed hard for their sins. Israel is going to be struck hard, it's going to be like on the day an east wind blows like a dry desert wind, or a Sirocco, that causes everything to wither in its path. Verses 10 and 11 describe just exile conditions when you, if you were to go to Jerusalem, you know, 10 years later or something like that and there's just nothing there it's just desolate.

Like in the book of Lamentations when the prophet Jeremiah looks over the city when the exile has happened and he says in Lamentations 1:1, "How desolate lies the city once so full of people." They are all gone. So we have this pastoral scene like calves that are grazing and just wild animals roaming and roving and a few women coming and finding some dead branches that they can break off or gather from the ground to use for firewood. It's a picture of death and judgment really and a very tragic picture. 

But also the middle of this section there's a sense in which yes it's going to be bad, it's gonna be really bad. But it's not as bad as it could be. And so in verse 7, he asks the question, "Has the Lord struck her”, Israel, “as he struck down those who struck her?" The Assyrians and the Babylonians let's say. Did she get the same thing that they got? The implication is no, they get worse actually, that's the implication of the question, they get actually worse treatment from God. “Has she been killed, as those who were killed who killed her?” Again, no. So, there's going to be a hard time, and she's going to be struck, she's going to be in some sense killed, but not in the same way. It's not going to be as bad, well, what's the difference?

Well, when the Assyrians invaded the northern kingdom, they destroyed many cities, killed lots and lots of people, and exiled the rest. When the Babylonians invaded the southern kingdom, the kingdom of Judah and the city of Jerusalem, they did the same thing: they crushed lots of towns and villages, they killed lots and lots of people and exiled the rest. But God has measured out Israel's punishment. NIV in verse 8, it's a very difficult verse but it says, "By warfare and exile you contend with her." The ESV is a little bit better, "Measure by measure by exile you contend with them." So God has measured out the discipline. He doesn't crush her as badly as she could have been crushed. You get this picture in Ezekiel's ministry, Ezekiel was ministering around the time of Jeremiah, and around the time the Babylonians came in. And Ezekiel was told to take a sharp sword and hone it like a razor and cut off the hairs off his head. So, shave his head remember? And then he's told to do different things with the hairs, he's told to divide them into thirds, and take a third of, take scales and measure out the hairs, and divide them up and take a third of your hairs and strike those hairs with the sword, and take a third and put them in into this his little replica of the city and burn it with fire, and kill them in the city, and then take the third pile and scatter it to the winds and chase them down with the sword. But take a few of your hairs and hide them in the cloak of your garment. Now, who are those few hairs? What are those hairs? Those are people, friends, those are seeds for the future. The Assyrians didn't get that, they didn't get that. The Babylonians they didn't get that. Have you met any Assyrians recently? Do you have any Assyrian friends? Is there a mission to the Assyrian that's going on right now? Is there a new tribes mission to the Babylonians? Friends, they're extinct. They were pursued to death, so also the Philistines, chased to death, but not so the Jews. And God said he would do this.

He told this to Isaiah, remember in Isaiah 6, he calls him, "Here am I Lord, send me." All right, time for the mission. "What do you want me to say?" "All right, go tell the people be ever hearing but never understanding, be ever seeing but never perceiving, make the people's heart callous, make their ears dull and close their eyes, otherwise they might see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their hearts, and turn and I might heal them.", "Well, that's a really bad message Lord, how long do I have to preach that?", "Well here's the answer, until the cities lie ruined and without inhabitant, until the houses are left deserted and the fields ruined and ravaged, until the Lord has sent everyone far away and the land is utterly forsaken, and though a tenth remains in the land, it will again be laid waste, but as the terebinth and oak leave stumps when they are cut down, so the holy seed will be the stump in the land. 

Guys, that's the remnant, those are the few hairs stuck in the folds of the garment. That's the seed for the future. And so no, she wasn't killed as those who were killed who killed her, and she wasn't struck as those who were struck... Who struck her. They get extinction, Israel doesn't, why, because God has a plan for Israel. There is a vibrant, sap-filled root system in the patriarchs: Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and in the promises made to them that means that they're going to come back and flourish. And so yes she'll be judged and punishment will be bitter, exile will happen, it will be like the a dry Sirocco wind, and it's going to wither everything. But the end result will be that they will turn away from their idolatry and hate it as much as he does. That's why he's doing it. So, you remember back in Isaiah 22 when God called on his people to weep and to wail, to tear out their hair and put on sackcloth remember that? And instead they partied, instead they had a big feast. 

Well after the exile there are actually two stories of hair pulling. It's something to look into. Okay, it's like stories of hair pulling, yes there's two stories of hair pulling, in Ezra and Nehemiah. Ezra pulled his own hair, when he found out that the people had started to intermarry again. He's like, "Ugh, what are you doing? Don't you understand what's happened? And now God's opened a little door for a remnant to come back and get established and look what you're doing, all over again." That's Ezra. Nehemiah pulled their hair. That's Nehemiah, okay, "I'm not pulling my hair I'm pulling yours." Look it up. That's the zeal and the passion inside them for them to hate their Asherah poles and their incense altars and crush them like chalk stones.

That's not the end of the story, verses 12 and 13, the elect will be gathered by a trumpet call one by one. Look at verses 12 and 13, "And in that day the Lord will thresh from the flowing Euphrates to the Wadi of Egypt, and you, Israelites will be gathered up one by one. And in that day a great trumpet will sound, and those who were are perishing in Assyria, and those who were are exiled in Egypt will come and worship the Lord on the holy mountain in Jerusalem."

So in that day, in the coming days, The Lord will thresh, threshing is separating the wheat from the chaff. He's going to separate out the wheat of his people. He's going to call the wheat to himself. John the Baptist said he's going to gather up the wheat into his barn and he's going to burn the chaff with unquenchable fire. He's going to thresh from the Euphrates to the Wadi of Egypt that was the promised land. Those were the extents of the promised land. They would know exactly what that territory meant. But the call would go beyond even to distant lands where the people had been scattered and there would be this trumpet call and the people would reassemble.

And then in the history of Egypt, or the history of Israel, the trumpet was a call to the people to assemble together for some purpose. Maybe the coronation of a king. Or maybe the people assembled at Mount Sinai to receive the law of Moses, assemble with the trumpet call, or maybe they would be assembled for battle to fight against their enemies, it was a trumpet call. As a matter of fact it was built into the law of Moses, the year of jubilee there'll be a trumpet call going out, and all the people would assemble together for worship and in the year of jubilee all debts would be canceled and all slaves set free, and everyone would return to their ancestral land, and it happened every 50 years so that meant probably you got one in your lifetime. Maybe if you got one when you were two and one when you were 102 you get two, but that's the exception. You might get it when you're 25, you might get it when you're 13. Okay? Who knows when it would happen? And that call would be a call of assembly and deliverance from all sin. 

And so this trumpet call goes out to assemble the people of God to come together at his holy mountain and worship and to praise him. Now Isaiah has already talked about this assembling at the holy mountain, and it's more than just the physical descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. It says in Isaiah chapter 2, "In the last days the mountain of the Lord's temple will be established as chief among the mountains, it will be raised above the hills, and all the nations will stream to it. Many peoples will come and say, ‘Come let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his way so that we may walk in his path.’” And so this trumpet call is going out to the ends of the earth to get the remnants to assemble and worship, end of chapter. 

Now it's time to preach Jesus. Okay, so who is the Lord that dismembers Leviathan? His name is Jesus. How does he dismember him? By dying on the cross and rising from the dead. It says in Hebrews chapter 2, "Because the children”, the elect, “have flesh and blood, he too”, Jesus, “shared in their humanity, so that by his death, he might destroy him who holds the power of death– that is the devil– and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.” I like the word destroy. For our purposes in Isaiah 27:1 how about dismember, amen? So that by his death he might dismember Satan, limb from limb. And how does he do it also? By his advancing Kingdom. As missionaries and evangelists go out and they take the good news of the gospel, and they proclaim that good news, Satan's kingdom shrinks every time it happens, and Satan is frustrated and he can't stop the elect from coming to faith in Christ. And ultimately by his second coming when he comes back in Revelation 19 and there's a sword, a fierce great and powerful sword coming out of the mouth of the rider on the horse, and with it he will slay the wicked. 

I don't think Jesus is literally going to have a sword coming out of his mouth. I think he's going to speak the word and the Antichrist will be gone. He's going to speak the word and the armies that oppose him will be destroyed. He just simply speaks the word. 2 Thessalonians 2, "The man of sin is the one whom the Lord will destroy by the splendor of his coming and by the word of his power, the breath of his mouth.” And so, the Lord Jesus will establish his people as a fruitful vineyard, a fruitful vineyard. We are, as I've mentioned before, gentiles grafted into a tree with a root system under us that's nourishing us with Jewish kind of spiritual blood, and we're deriving life from the promises made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and we are flourishing, and Jesus is the vine and we are the branches and we are to bear much fruit for apart from him we can do nothing. It's in Christ that we are the fruitful vineyard.

 And it's in Christ or because of Christ alone that God says in verse 4, "I have no wrath. I'm not angry at you. There's no condemnation for you, my wrath is appeased. The blood of Jesus has been shed, my wrath is propitiated," in Romans chapter 3, "He is the propitiation for our sins, the one who turns away the wrath of God." God's not angry at you anymore because of your sins. And in Christ alone can his enemies run and flee and take hold of him for refuge. Can I just urge you to do that today, if you consider yourself right now, an outsider, the Bible says that you are under the wrath of God if you're an outsider. Flee the wrath of God. Come and take hold of Jesus.

You're asking how do I do that? Just ask him to be your Savior. Just say, "Lord I'm a sinner, I'm on the outside, I'm afraid of your wrath, I don't want to go to hell. I don't want to stand before you and give an account for my wickedness and my lust and my laziness, will you please save me? Would you please save me from my sins." And he will. He says, "Let them make peace with me, yes let them make peace with me, that's a better idea.” Why don't you come to Jesus and let him make peace with you, let him reconcile you. And in Christ alone the remnant of Jews is saved, that remnant that it discusses here, that remnant of Jacob and Israel find their salvation and their fruitfulness in Christ alone. 

And God still measures out our disciplines. He doesn't crush us like our sins deserve. He'll hurt you. He'll spank you, he'll train you. But measure by measure. And he does it according to the Book of Hebrews, he disciplines us so that we may share in his holiness and may bear fruit for him. And so God measures up disciplines when you're under the discipline of the Lord realize he's dealing wisely with you, and causing you to hate your sins and crush your own altar stones, whatever they are like chalk and get rid of them out of your life.

What about that trumpet call? Could it be we're called on to blow that trumpet? That we are called on to go out this week and talk to people about Jesus, that were called to say, "Hey, why don't you come to Christ, why don't you believe in him? Come from outside where the judgment of God is and come in and come to faith, and let God bless you. Let him forgive you of all your sins. We are the trumpet blasts. We're the ones that got out to the ends of the earth and say, "Come to faith, come to Christ." Close with me in prayer.

Father, we thank you for what we've learned in your word, we thank you for Isaiah 27. It's a chapter that perhaps we're not very familiar with but I thank you for being our hero, for going out to take on the dragon and fight for us 'cause we couldn't fight for ourselves, and to deliver us and rescue us, Oh Lord. We were weak and powerless and we could not save ourselves but you went forth as a mighty warrior Jesus, and you fight and you fought for us and you died on the cross and you rose again. Oh God I pray for any lost person right now that they would hear this gospel message and be saved and help us O Lord to know how much you love us, and how much you're watering us constantly and causing us to be fruitful, help us to be fruitful for your glory, and we pray in Jesus name, amen.

An expository sermon on Isaiah 26 unfolding the promises of the future heavenly peace for the elected that trust in Jesus.

This morning, I went as I was eating my breakfast to The Voice of the Martyrs website and was reading some of the news spots that are there. About 10 days ago in East Moscow, a church in Russia was leveled in the middle of the night by a group of unknown workers, anonymous workers, no one knew who they were, where they were coming from, but they were clearly supported by the police. And so they got bulldozers and they just leveled this church, just destroyed it. A custodian who spends the night at the church to protect it and all that was taken away to the police station and held there through the night while this was going on. So clearly the police were in collusion with the destruction of that church building. And last Sunday, our brothers and sisters in Christ in that church brought folding chairs to the pile of rubble that was their building and worship right there on the site. Praise God.

Also, on that same website, there was a story of a Nigerian pastor. He and his family, his wife and three children were assaulted in the middle of the night by at least seven Muslim men, wielding guns. They came and they shot his 24-year-old son in the leg, he was able to knock his attacker down and run. The father came and he was fired at and fell to the ground, both of them on the ground, huddled together and their attackers thought they were dead and left them, then went and found his wife and two smaller children, and ordered them to lie face down on the ground there, and then they proceeded to burn the house around them, and then left. The wife and two children were able to escape and hide in the bushes.

These attackers, these seven men were calling out, "Allahu Akbar", which is “Great is Allah”. By the way, no Christian should ever translate Allah, God. Allah, liken it to saying, greatest Molech or greatest another false god. So we don't translate it the same way, we don't believe the same things, it's not the same god. But this is the kind of persecutions going on in Nigeria and the state doesn't have the strength to shut it down because of the divided nature of Nigeria.

And then in Pakistan, there's a 14-year-old girl who has special needs. A Christian, comes from a Christian family, is accused by the religious police or the government there of burning some of the pages of the Qur’an, and she's facing the death penalty. Again, special needs mentally challenged, but with a simple faith in Christ. As a result of this case being made known, 300 Muslim extremists surrounded the area and started chanting, "Death to the unbelievers."

Well, there are other such stories, you can read about them at the Voice of the Martyrs. The reason that I specifically went to that website this morning was because of Isaiah 26. And as I'm seeking to just preach through the Book of Isaiah, I'm seeking to understand this chapter and this text, it occurred to me there's just kind of at least, but two different ways that I could approach the sermon this morning. One of them easier and the other one harder.

The easy way is to go through and find the gem verses. Okay? So the gem verses and there's at least four different gem verses in this text that just pop up off the page, there's the danger. They just pop up off the page and they're just awesome, and you can write them on 3 x 5 cards, and you can memorize them, and they'll just be incredible verses for you, they really will. I'm not being facetious. Look, for example, at Isaiah 26:3. Isaiah 26:3 is just one of those gem verses in the Book of Isaiah. Look what it says. "You will keep in perfect peace him whose mind is steadfast, because he trusts in you." Oh, what a great verse that is. So what does that tell you? Verse 4 tells you what you should do with it, trust in the Lord, because the Lord, the Lord is the rock eternal. So those two verses together are so awesome, they're on the cover of your bulletin. So you can just read them and you can say, "Wow, what great verses." So I could take maybe a quarter, a third of my preaching time and just preach on those verses. Okay?

But then there's Verse 8. I love Verse 8. Okay. “Yes, Lord, walking in the way of your laws, we wait for you. Your name and renown are the desire of our hearts.” Oh, that's another great verse, maybe not as famous as verse 3. But great, your name and renown are the desire of our hearts. So I could take a quarter of my preaching time on that verse and just tell you how awesome it is that God's name and renown would be the desire of our hearts. And then, you know, go on from there to verse 12, for example, "Lord, you establish or ordain peace for us. All that we have accomplished, you have done for us." And there I could talk about how God sovereignly works his will in our hearts, and he achieves his purposes in us by his spirit, and we can just trust in God that he is going to, as it says in Hebrews 13:21, "Work in us, what is pleasing to him, to God be the glory."

And then I could finish the sermon up at Verse 19, I think, which is another great resurrection verse. So verse 19, "But your dead will live. Their bodies will rise. You who dwell in the dust, wake up and shout for joy. Your dew is like the dew of the morning. The earth will give birth to her dead." And I would finish up that awesome sermon by preaching the resurrection. Amen! So you say, “Pastor, just do that, that sounds like a great sermon”. Yeah, well, the problem is, all the other verses. All the other verses. What about them? I don't know. We all say, “I don't know”. What is it? And Jesus said to Satan in the desert, "Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God." All scripture is God-breathed and is useful. My burden is all 21 verses, not just the gem verses, and the gem verses are gems, and I'm going to do some of what I just did, I guess I already did, didn't I? So they're very encouraging already, and you're already encouraged, and well, you should be, but I want to try as best I can to understand the whole chapter. And then set those gem verses in their context so that they really flourish in our life because they just think that's a better approach to the Bible.

So then what is the whole chapter about? Well, the whole chapter is set in the flow of chapters that are just really marvelous, and Isaiah 24-27, this section of Isaiah really is very much like the Book of Revelation dealing with huge, big issues throughout all of human history, right to the end of human history. And so in Isaiah 24, as we saw, it's predicting the destruction of the whole Earth and the establishment of God's reign in Jerusalem gloriously for all eternity. That was chapter 24, a marvelous chapter. 

And then in 25, last week, we talked about the resurrection from the dead, and how God is going to spread a feast of banquet for all peoples, and he's going to swallow up death forever, and we're gonna sit at this banquet table, in which God is the feast, and we're going to enjoy him forever. At the end of 25 though, there's still Moab, this, I think, symbolic of the wicked of the Earth, who will not submit to God, dealing with God's judgments and basically getting crushed under the judgments of God and unable to escape them and to get away from what God is doing in judgment. So that's the end of 25, and we go right from that into 26.

 And so, what's going on in 26? Well, if you look at the whole chapter, this is encouragement given to the people of God, the oppressed people of God, before God does those great deliverances. He's feeding the oppressed, suffering people of God with encouragement and verses and things that will help them to endure until the final judgment has come. That's what the whole chapter is about. And those gem verses fit into that overall word of encouragement to the oppressed people of God before the deliverance finally comes, that's what the whole chapter is about, which immediately brings me as an American pastor to the question of, "Well, what about us who are not going to face this level of persecution, this level of suffering, what do we do with Isaiah 26?" If I really preach this the way the chapter is written, I'm gonna be preaching about oppression, and persecution, and danger, and hiding in rooms until it passes by and then coming out and enjoy at last, the oppressors have been crushed. And it's like, "Well, that's not kind of the life we're living here in America, how do I make sense of that?" And so that work is still in front of me.

The sermon's been a work in progress all morning, and hopefully it'll be done by the time I finish preaching. Most of it anyway. But just trying to understand, we who are not going through what the church in Russia, nobody's surrounding us with a cordon of people and then taking a bulldozer and leveling our building and the police aiding and abetting it, that's not going on here. Okay? We don't have gun-wielding people running through yelling "Allahu Akbar" and shooting pastors here in the name of Allah, that's not going on in our country, not that I know of. And if so, it would be probably job, one for the police to hunt him down, it would be clearly nothing the government or the surrounding culture embraced. And neither do we have the kind of situation where that special needs 14-year-old girl is facing a death sentence, because it seems she burned some pages of the Qur’an. Truth of the matter, I don't know, I didn't research far enough to find out what actually happened. But what do we do with it? What's our context and how does Isaiah 26 fit into that? That's my job today. And try my best to explain it. 

So it begins in verses 1-6, with a marvelous song of trust in God. Look at those verses, “In that day, this song will be sung in the land of Judah, we have a strong city, God makes salvation its walls and ramparts. Open the gates that the righteous nation may enter the nation that keeps faith. You will keep in perfect peace, him whose mind is steadfast, because he trusts in you. Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord, the Lord is the rock eternal. He humbles those who dwell on high, He lays the lofty city low, He levels it to the ground and casts it down to the dust. Feet trample it down. The feet of the oppressed, the footsteps of the poor.” So this is a song to be sung by the suffering.

Look at Verse 1, "In that day, this song will be sung in the land of Judah." So in the day of the Lord, in the day of God's deliverance, in the day when God acts. It says in the land of Judah, so this has a very Jewish setting, there's a very Jewish feel, and so it's not necessarily right for us to go immediately from here to us, we have to pass through redemptive history grid first to try to find out what Isaiah was talking about. And so Isaiah is prophesying before either of the two great exiles of the Jewish people from the promised land have happened. The Assyrian exile hasn't happened yet, the Babylonian exile hasn't happened yet. And it's going to begin, those two exiles began what Jesus called the times of the gentiles, in which the Jews are a downtrodden oppressed people who do not have political control of the promised land, and they're going to be crushed. There's going to be invasions, there's going to be one army after another coming in. 

But in the middle of that time, through that time, this song of trust will be sung in the land of Judah. People are gonna be trusting in God while all that's going on, does that make sense? Trusting in God for the ultimate salvation of their souls. So they're going to sing this song in the land of Judah, this song of praise and of trust, and here we have, as Ron mentioned in his prayer, and thank you, Ron, for the City of God reference again. In this whole section, we're not gonna get away from Augustine's City of God because we keep getting city and city, and it's right here, you get verse 1, we have a strong city, God makes salvation its walls and ramparts.

So while all the suppression and destruction's going on, we have a strong city, and salvation is its wall and its rampart, it's marvelous. But then in verses 5 and 6, you get a city that's going to be destroyed by the wrath of God and downtrodden by the feet of the oppressed, the footsteps of the poor are gonna lay that lofty, arrogant city low, that's the city of man. So we have the city of God and the city of man, as we've talked about again, we have that right even in these six verses. So we have the city of God first. Now, the city of God, according to Augustine is the company of the elect of the work of God in assembling a marvelous new Jerusalem out of living stones quarried from every tribe and language and people and nation. First Peter 2 talks about that. And we are quarried out, we living stones that are set in place in a growing awesome temple. Ephesians 2, or city of God, filled with God's Spirit, giving glory to God. That's the city of God. So as the Gospel advances through evangelism and missions and people come over faith, they regenerate, they are set like living stones into this new rising city, marvelous, the city of God. 

City of man, according to Augustine as Rome was invaded and in a mild way conquered by Alaric and the Visigoths for the first time, much worse judgments to come later, but the shocks were going to the edge of the known Roman world at that point, and Jerome in a cave near Bethlehem was saying it's the end of the world. And Augustine said, "No, it's just another phase of the city of man." And what is the city of man? Human culture, human military achievement, human scientific or cultural achievements, all of that city of man rising and falling, rising and falling, just going on. Built with arrogance. Built with military conquest. Built with money. Lust of the eyes, lust of the flesh, boastful pride of life. This is the world. So you have man. Those are the two cities that we have here.

Now, the city of God in Verse 1 is said to be a strong city. A strong city. We have a strong city. And it's not Jerusalem, you get that sense that those walls are coming down. No, but our city, the walls will never come down, why? Because God makes salvation its walls and ramparts as though every stone in the wall of our city has the word salvation written on it. And so, a city back then was only as strong as how high and how thick its walls were. And ramparts were where archers could stand up and shoot down at the enemies with impunity, with protection, and they could just defend the city. Could not be taken if the walls maintain their integrity, and Isaiah is saying, these walls will never come down. These walls will never come down. So salvation for the city of God is based on God's sovereign intention to save it.

God's sovereign power, later when we get to this shortly in a few months maybe in Isaiah 37. How the Assyrians have invaded and conquered the northern kingdom and deported it, and they're coming down for the Southern Kingdom of Judah, and godly King Hezekiah is in the city of Jerusalem. And Assyrian army is coming and they're going to besiege Jerusalem. They're gonna take it like every other city, so they think. And God speaks this word, I love this, he will not enter this city, he will not even shoot an arrow against it, he will not build siege works against it. By the way that he came, he will return, he will not enter this city, I will defend this city for the sake of my own glory and for the sake of David my servant. Well, what happened with the Assyrians? Who won? Yeah, you know that, you know that story. If God says they're not coming to this city, they don't come.

And so God makes salvation this city's walls and ramparts because God's sovereign power is committed to protecting it. So what does that do for us as Christians? We are safe in Jesus. Amen. We are protected in Jesus. Jesus, the Good Shepherd, said in John 10, concerning his sheep, “I give them eternal life, and no one can snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me is greater than all, and no one can snatch them out of my Father's hand. I and the Father are one”. So we are protected, we have a strong city. God makes salvation its walls and ramparts, we are safe and secure. Verse 2 says. "Open then the gates that the righteous nation may come in, may enter the nation that keeps faith." So who gets to go in the city? Who gets to enter the city, the righteous nation, the one that keeps faith. In the Old Covenant, there was a way to keep the Old Covenant, but the keeping of that covenant did not make you righteous, so ultimately only by faith do you enter this city. Even back then in the Old Covenant days, and so also now for us, and so this addresses two things; first, who enters the city to begin with? Who's even part of this city? Friends, the answer to that is believers in Jesus Christ, by repentance and faith in Jesus, you may enter this city of salvation and you will never leave it. You'll be protected there forever and ever.

So open the gates. Open the gates that the righteous nation may enter the nation that keeps faith, but also in the end, ultimately in the Book of Revelation, we're told that the new Jerusalem with these awesome, sparkling, beautiful, precious gem walls have city gates that never get closed ever. The gates are never closed. So it says in Revelation 21:25-27 "On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there. The glory and honor of the nations will be brought into it. Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb's Book of Life". So the idea is that the new Jerusalem doesn't need to shut its gates 'cause there's no enemies on the outside anymore, they're gone. It's safe, it's secure. The warfare has ended. And so what we're supposed to do before that comes as look ahead to that city, look ahead to the time when the gates will stand open and there'll be no enemies, no threat anymore. When the universe will be cleaned up and the wicked will all be perishing in the lake of fire, and we who are the redeemed will be completely safe and peaceful. That's what it's saying. And so therefore, Isaiah gives us these gem verses in verse three and four: "You will keep in perfect peace him whose mind is steadfast because he trusts in you". Do you see the context now?

In the midst of all of this suffering, in the midst of the oppression that the new Jerusalem hasn't come yet, we have to have our minds stayed upon Jehovah, as the hymn puts it, in Like a River Glorious, stayed upon Jehovah, our minds fixed on him. And it says, "You will keep Him". And the Hebrew is beautiful. Shalom, shalom. Not just Shalom. But Sshalom, shalom. So what is shalom? Shalom is a full, rich, blessed peace that goes to every area of your life, every single area of your life, your body, your soul, your relationship with God, with each other, your material situation, everything, just the richness of blessing from God, that's shalom. But that's apparently not enough so it's shalom, shalom. The NIV just gives us “perfect peace”, as actually a number of translations do. Alright, so God will keep that person in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed upon or leaning upon or resting upon Jehovah, upon God. So it seems like our responsibility is to stay our minds upon God, don't be what James calls a double-minded man or woman, see what I'm saying? Don't be like that, but fix your mind on God, fix your mind on his promises. Look ahead to the city that's coming and yearn to live there, fix your mind on that, and God will keep you in perfect peace if you do that, ain't that beautiful?

 It's a peace like the peace that God himself enjoys. I mean, do you realize how peaceful of being God is? It's marvelous to think about that. God just sitting serenely on his throne above the circle of the Earth, he's just up there. What troubles God? What's the answer to that question? What troubles God? Nothing. Ever. He's never troubled. Now, he is compassionate, he links his heart to his people, he has all kinds of emotions tied with us as a compassionate God, but in and of himself, nothing troubles him. The eternal plan is right on schedule, friends. And nothing can stop it. He's at peace. With him, there's not a shifting shadow of doubt or fear or anything ever, ever, ever. And so God keeps a believing man or woman, boy or girl in that kind of Godlike peace, if they will just focus their minds on him and his promises. I think a parallel verse to this very much is Philippians 4:6-7. And there it says, "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your request to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus". Do you see how connected Isaiah 26, that is? The peace of God will be a wall around you, God will exert energy to keeping you peaceful if you'll just pray and trust in him.

So Philippians 4:6-7, whatever is troubling you, whatever is burdening you today, whatever it is, your own sin, guilty conscience, alright? Financial troubles, anxieties about the future, medical issues for yourself or for a loved one, relational issues in your marriage, with your kids or your parents, brothers and sisters, friends. You're troubled by something, Philippians 4, and Isaiah 26, say, "Bring it to God and lay it as his feet. Give it to him. Cast your burdens on him and let him protect your mind. Let him keep you in perfect peace." And so it says verse 4, "Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord, the Lord is the rock eternal." Well, that's the city of God. By contrast, the city of man is cast down. Do you see this in verse 5 and 6? He humbles those who dwell on high, he lays the lofty city low, he levels it to the ground and casts it down to the dust. Feet trample it down. The feet of the oppressed, the footsteps of the poor. So these are the poor and oppressed people of God who are going to get trampled by these wicked forces in human history, they're going to get trampled. But in the end, they're gonna do the trampling, amen. They're gonna walk over the piles of rubble and celebrate, like it says in Romans 16, I love this. "The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet". Isn't that a great verse? 

 This is the same kind of idea. The feet of the godly will walk on the rubble of wickedness, and we will live, and they will be gone. And so this is a song of encouragement to God's oppressed people before the deliverance comes. It's given to them to sing by faith, trusting before the deliverance comes, do you see verses one through six. Now, in verses 7-18, it gets a little more serious, it's more of a lament there, although there's some great encouragement, you still get a sense of the fact that the people of God are going to go through a very hard time. He begins by talking about how you wait on the Lord, verses 7-9, “Walking in righteousness, waiting for the Lord, the path of the righteous is level; you, upright one, you make the path, the way of the righteous smooth. Yes, Lord, walking in the way of your laws, we wait for you. Your name and renown are the desire of our hearts. My soul yearns for you in the night; in the morning, my spirit longs for you". So I think these verses, verses 7-9, are describing the healthy walk, the believing walk of the people of God while they're waiting for God to deliver them. You see? This is how you do it, this is how you walk with the Lord while you're waiting for the deliverance.

Isaiah speaks of the path of the upright. Despite the suffering that they're going through, their path is smooth. Path is smooth. I thought often and I've talked to my kids about this, that in the Book of Proverbs, it says, "The path of the upright is a smooth highway, but the way of the sluggard is blocked in with thorns". So the sluggard is the lazy person, the procrastinator, the messy person, all that sort of stuff. It's like if you want an easy life, don't be that way. It's a lot better to walk in God's ways, your way is made smooth by the commands of God, it's an easier, better life. Believe me, the life of the righteous is not easy, ultimately, that's the whole point of this chapter, but to some degree, God's commands make their way through the world like a highway. A cleared highway, and they know what to do. They're not in doubt. And so I think about Psalm 119:105, where the Psalm is celebrating the word of God, it says. "Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path." 

And so it says, "Walking in the way of your laws, we wait for you." So there's a smooth highway of the highway of God's Word, of God's laws, and that's how they wait for God. In the middle of this obedient lifestyle is a yearning to be with God, look at verse 9, it says, "My soul yearns for you in the night. In the morning, my spirit longs for you". You see the longing of this individual, they're waiting on God, longing, they're walking in obedience, but they're longing for God. And waiting for God's never easy. Read, Psalm 13, "How long O Lord, how long? Will you make me wait forever? How long must my enemy triumph over me? How long must my enemy trample me in the ground? How long is this gonna go on, O Lord?" Now again, if you're living in Nigeria, you're living in Pakistan, you're living in Iran, you're living in China, you're living in a certain place, you're asking, how long is this going to go on? Deliver me from my oppressors. But we're waiting on God, yearning for God, wanting to be with him. That's how you do it. In verse 8, going back one verse, it says, "your name and renown", I love the NIV's translation here better than the other ones, 'cause generally it's name and remembrance, but I love renown because frankly name is renown anyway, that God's name would be known in the earth, it's his fame is that God would be famous. 

It's like, is God famous? Well, not as famous as he should be, unless you renown Jesus. Is Jesus famous? Oh yes, he's really famous. But he's not as famous as he should be. Amen? More people should know about Jesus. That's called missions, that's called evangelism. More people should know about Jesus. And so verse 8, what verse 8 is saying is in effect what the Lord's prayer says, right? "Our Father who art in heaven". What's the next part? "Hallowed be thy name". Verse 8, it's the same thing, "O God, may your name be exalted in the nations, may your name be held in honor, O God. May the peoples of the world praise you and know you and exalt you, O Lord", verse 8. So your name, your fame is the desire of my heart. That's powerful. That's a good way to wait, amen? A good way to wait. Well, it's also good to understand what God's judgments are for, look at verse 9, "When your judgments come upon the Earth, the people of the world learn righteousness".

So when God acts, when he moves in redemptive history and pours out his judgments, the people of the world, it says, learn righteousness. So through the flood of Noah, as God pours out water all over the surface of the Earth, the people of the world learn righteousness. As God pours out fire and brimstone on Sodom and Gomorrah, the people of the world learn righteousness. Right? As God pours out his plagues, his ten plagues on Egypt, one after the other, and the judgments come one after the other on Egypt, and God is spanking them, badly, the people of the world learn righteousness. Well, who learns? Well, Verse 10-11 says, who doesn't learn? Look at Verse 10-11. "Though grace is shown to the wicked, they do not learn righteousness. Even in a land of uprightness, they go on doing evil and regard not the majesty of the Lord. O Lord, your hand is lifted high, but they do not see it".

Frankly, when it comes to the wicked, it doesn't matter either way, what God does. If God doesn't pour out his judgments, if he defers his judgments and allows them to continue on in the same life they've always had, they think he doesn't exist, or if he exists, he approves of what they're doing and is just like them. Psalm 94 says this, "How long will the wicked, O Lord, how long will the wicked be jubilant? They pour out arrogant words, all the evil doers are full of boasting, they crush your people, O Lord, they oppress your inheritance, they slay the widow and the alien, they murder the fatherless." Listen to this, they say, "The Lord does not see, the God of Jacob pays no heed". But it says in Romans chapter 2, "But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you're storing up wrath against yourself, for the day of God's wrath. When his righteous judgment will be revealed, God will give to each person according to what he has done.” You didn't realize that the kindness and the tolerance of God was meant to lead you to repentance. God is being patient and not pouring out his wrath on you, so that he's giving you time to repent, but it doesn't mean that he condones what you do. But then when the judgments do come, when the hurricanes come, when the earthquakes come, when the invading army comes, they think that God doesn't exist in a different way, or that God's evil or does wicked things, and so they don't learn. Verse 10, "grace, shown to the wicked, doesn't change their minds”, even though mercy and patience and tolerance is shown to them. But God does all of this to teach the elect. You know who learns? We do. Seriously. Class was in session at Noah's flood, right? When the lesson was done, who learned righteousness? Noah and his family. Because they're the only ones left. Who learned righteousness from Sodom and Gomorrah? Abraham did, and he passed on the lesson to Isaac and to his family. 

 God is righteous and hates wickedness, and so it's all about the zeal that God has for his people, verse 11, "O Lord, your hand is lifted high, but they do not see it”, the wicked, “let them see your zeal for your people and be put to shame, let the fire reserved for your enemies consume them”. So the wicked people, the Assyrians, when they come in and they're successful, they misread it, they don't understand, they think their Gods are more powerful than Yahweh. When the Babylonians come, in the book of Habakkuk says, they sacrifice to their nets to their military prowess. Okay, they didn't understand. When the Persians came in, Cyrus the great, it says in Isaiah 45 "Though you do not acknowledge me". He had no idea who God was. When Alexander the Great came, he built, he just named one city after another after himself. Alexandria, Alexandria. Alexandria. "Hey, a new town, what should we name it?", "I have an idea, Alexandria". And he made himself a god and he struck coins for himself and he wanted to be worshipped. He missed the point. God was judging the wicked of the Earth through him, and soon he would judge him too.

God is glorified in crushing tyrants and enlarging the nation. Look at Verses 12-15, "Lord, you established peace for us, all that we have accomplished, you have done for us, O Lord, our God, Other Lords besides you have ruled over us, but your name alone do we honor. They are now dead, they live no more. Those departed spirits do not rise. You punished them and brought them to ruin, you wiped out all memory of them". Verse 15, "You have enlarged the nation, O Lord, You have enlarged the nation. You have gained glory for yourself, you've extended all the borders of the land." So this is speaking of God's glory in crushing these tyrants, establishing peace for the remnant, and judging in verse 13 and 14, the tyrants who ruled over the Jews and rolled over the people of God at that time. They're dead now, all of them. Where is Pharaoh? He's dead now. Where's Sennacherib, king of Assyria? He's dead now. All of them, they're dead. And they rise no more, their time of judgment came and they died, but God re-established his people, showed grace to them and actually enlarged the borders of their land and gave them great population. He restored them.

Now, godly Jews in the midst of all of this did not say, “Lord, thank you so much for restoring us and increasing our population and all that, I know it's because we were so righteous as we obeyed your laws.” Oh, dear friends, just read Daniel chapter 9, Daniel is on his face saying, “God, we have acted wickedly and we broke your commandments.” Ezra did the same thing, Nehemiah did the same thing. All of the godly knew that they presented wickedness to God in disobedience. So therefore, verse 12, the honesty says, “O Lord, anything good in us, you worked in us. All that we have accomplished, you have done through us.” Do you realize how important a theme that is? Preached on it a few weeks ago in Hebrews 13:21. "O God, would you please work in us what is pleasing to you?" So here's another gem verse, but I'm just telling you, if there's something wrong in your life, if you're being disobedient, if there's some active unrighteousness, bring this to God, “God, work righteousness in me. God, transform me. And if you will do that, I will give you the full glory for the change in my life.” And so it says very plainly in John, chapter 3:20-21. "Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed, but everyone who lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what He did has been done through God."

So on judgment day, we come with our good deeds and we say, "God, you did all of this in us, praise you forever." That's the way we cast our crowns down before Jesus and give him praise and glory. Or as Philippians 2:13 says, "May God work in us." Or it says in 2:13 is "God who works in us to will and to act according to his good purpose." And so, God enlarges the nation. Is this merely speaking about the restoration of the Jews seven years after the Babylonian exile? I don't think so. Forty thousand Jews came back and we got re-established in the promised land, and that was significant. But friends, I'm just gonna see missions in verse 15, what do you say? He's going to enlarge the borders or the boundaries of Israel, he is going to enlarge the nation, he is going to extend it, he's going to gain glory for himself by extending the borders of the land. Amen. Hallelujah.

How about we gentiles become honorary Jews by adoption? We can be sons and daughters of Abraham. What do you say? Does that sound good to you? And we will take on the promises made to Abraham, and we'll believe them for ourselves and will be included in that whole thing, and we'll get to sit with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob at a Jewish table in the kingdom of heaven forever. Does that sound good to you? I'm fine being grafted into a Jewish tree. I was cut out of a wild olive shoot and I was grafted into a Jewish cultivated tree. Amen. I'm an honorary Jew. And that's how God extended the borders of the land by missions, by evangelism, by being Jesus being a light to the gentiles, a glory to his people, Israel. But in the meantime, verses 16-18, we lament our weakness, it's still hard. And this is the reality of it, this is why I say if you're living in Nigeria, if you're living in Pakistan, if you're living in Iran, you're living in China, you're living in these places; these verses say, "God actually sees what I'm going through.” Thank you for Isaiah 26. Thank you for speaking to my situation, 'cause I'm going through a really hard time right now.

Lord, they, the people of God came to you in their distress. When you discipline them, they could barely whisper a prayer. As a woman with child and about to give birth writhes and cries out in her pain, so are we in your presence. We were with child, we writhe in pain, but we gave birth to wind, nothing good came out of all of our agonies, all of our labors had amounted, it seems to nothing, we've not brought salvation to the earth, we have not given birth to people of the world. These people under the oppressors feel their weakness, they're not actually able to achieve the purposes of God in this world, they are just getting crushed and they can barely whisper a prayer to God.

 They yearn for God to step in and end their suffering, and so God does. In verses 19-21, "But your dead will live. Their bodies will rise. You who dwell in the dust, wake up and shout for joy. Your dew is like the dew of the morning. The earth gives birth, will give birth to her dead." Now, why does resurrection come in? First of all, this is one of those great, great passages on resurrection in the Old Testament. I was talking to Kyle Mercer this week, he's taking a class at Duke on the resurrection. And so one of the messages there is there's a hint that there's no resurrection in the Old Testament. Have you heard that? Oh my goodness.

It came in with the Greek philosophers, the idea of the immortality of the soul, and then by the time the New Testament is written, it had taken root. Oh, friends. How about Isaiah 26:19? As you look down and you read these, or do you see any resurrection here? Are you seeing any resurrection in there. Let me read it again, I'll read it slowly. "But your dead will live." I'm thinking resurrection. I'm thinking that. "Well, yeah. But not bodily resurrection. This is a metaphor." Well, let's keep reading. "Their bodies will rise." Okay. [chuckle] Hard, hard to avert the force of it. “You who dwell in the dust, wake up and shout for joy. Your dew is like the dew of the morning. The earth will give birth to her dead.” Okay, text, you win. This is resurrection. Why does it come in here? Why here? Why now? Because a lot of God's people actually get killed. They actually do die. The blood of martyrs is seed for the church. They actually die. And if you remain... By the way, the text is for we who remain, the ones who went on ahead, they're happy, they're fine, they don't actually even need the physical Bible, they get God face-to-face teaching them. Amen. We're the one seeing through the glass darkly, so we get promises like this, and so we are to know that our brothers and sisters who got crushed and died will rise again, they will come alive. Ultimate victory. And so the martyrs in Revelation 6, the fifth seal are under the altar crying out saying, "How long O Lord, until we get our vengeance?" They're looking for vengeance there in Revelation, and God tells them "Wait a little bit, wait a little longer, until the full number of the martyrs would come in. And then I'm gonna deal with it." And you can read about God's dealing with it in the rest of the Book of Revelation.

So resurrection will come, and his name is Jesus. His name is Jesus. Jesus said to Martha, your brother will rise again. "Oh, Lord, I know he'll rise at the resurrection on the last day, I read Isaiah 26:19. I know there's a resurrection coming." Jesus said, "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live even though he dies. And whoever lives and believes in me will never die." So resurrection is coming, his name is Jesus. In the meantime, ride it out. That's what verse 20 and 21 is saying in the meantime, ride it out, "Go, my people, enter your rooms, and shut the doors behind you. Hide yourselves for a little while until His wrath has passed by. See, the Lord is coming out of His dwelling to punish the people of the earth for their sins. The earth will disclose the blood shed upon her. She will conceal her slain no longer."

So this is the Nigerian pastor and his wife and kids running in the dark of the night and finding a bush and hiding behind it. So the text says to do "Go hide yourself until it passes by, find a place of refuge and hunker down and just survive. Do the best you can to get through it until finally, the judgments come." And they will come. The earth is going to, verse 21, "disclose the blood shed upon her." So in the Nigerian story, the blood came from the leg of his 24-year-old son, went down in the earth, drank it in. The earth's been doing that a long time. Since the time of Cain, remember? Remember how God said to Cain, "What have you done? Listen, listen, do you not hear it? Your brother's blood cries from the ground.” What does it cry for? For vengeance. It cries for justice. And so the earth is going to disclose the blood shed upon it. These wicked oppressors will be judged.

 So what application can we take from this? Well, first come to Christ, he is the only refuge from the real storm that's coming. Jesus is the refuge, He's the hiding place. Flee of Christ. You came this morning to hear exposition on Isaiah 26, but if you're not a believer, I think you came to hear this, "Jesus saves sinners." All you have to do is cry out to the Lord, ask him to save your soul. Say, I'm a sinner, I deserve to go to hell. I have no righteousness to offer you, I don't wanna go to hell. Would you please save me, Jesus? His blood shed on the cross is sufficient for you and for me. Trust in him, he's the refuge, he is salvation whose walls surround you.

 Secondly, for we who live in America, pray for the persecuted church. Find out about them. Go to ‘Voice of the Martyrs’, google that, or just persecution.org, I think it is. Just dial in and then read these stories, and then like Isaiah 26 changes for you a bit. It's like, "Oh, I see it now, I get it, I get why this chapter's here." You say, "Well, what about us? We don't go through this kind of persecution." Well, I've covered this in other sermons, we have our own versions, and it's proportional to our faithfulness in evangelism, the more faithful you are in evangelism, the more you're gonna get smacked a bit by Americans. It's just gonna happen. So if you're faithful in evangelism, you're gonna get the back of someone's hand metaphorically, or maybe even literally, I don't know. 

For the present, the government will not support it, but if they're gonna keep booing God at national conventions, I don't know how the future looks about that. So I guess I would also say don't expect a peaceful relationship with the surrounding world and the surrounding culture, don't expect it and think something strange is happening when they smack us, get that out of this. And then just look at the lessons that he gives in this chapter on how to live in the meantime, so verse 3, "Keep your mind stayed upon the Lord." Verse 4, "Trust in the Lord, let Him bring peace to you in circumstances that are difficult." Verse 8, "Walk in the ways of God's laws, by the power of the Spirit."

Wait for the Lord, wait for him to bring about his end. Verse 8, "Let God's name and renown be the desire of your heart.” Live for missions and evangelism. Live for those things, verse 9, understand the purpose of God's judgments are to teach you righteousness, that you can learn righteousness. Verse 12, understand that all of your good works, God has worked in you and give him the glory. And eighth, hunker down, it's going to get worse before it gets better. It's just Jesus said, "In this world, you will have trouble, but take heart, I've overcome the world." Close with me in prayer.

Father, we thank you for the time that we've had to study in your word, I thank you for the lessons of Isaiah 26. Father, help us to take to heart these messages. I pray one more time for any unregenerate person, any lost person, somebody who just doesn't know how to go to heaven who feel so guilty for their sins, let them turn to you, Lord Jesus now and say, Jesus save me. Pray this in Jesus name. Amen.

Pastor Andy Davis preaches a verse by verse expository sermon on Isaiah 25:1-12 and how God will eventually eliminate death and all pain.

“Faith smells the fragrance, when as yet there is no rose.” I read that on a church sign this morning as I was driving to church, on the Free Will Baptist Church right up the road from us, they have a sign ministry, and some of the signs are good. Some of them. Some of them are just bad puns, I think. But some of them really do point to deeper things and are great encouragement, and this one was, and I thought, “What an incredible introduction even to the sermon that I wanna preach today.” Faith smells the fragrance when as yet there is no rose. 

Now, the Book of Isaiah, the prophet Isaiah is a visionary prophet. You just close your eyes, you have any section of Isaiah read and visions just come in your mind. The vision that Isaiah, son of Amos, saw, that's a visionary book. And there are visions that come from Isaiah 25, but for me it was... I think more of a fragrance wafting from this chapter. It was the fragrance of a feast that God is going to spread for us in heaven. And only by faith are we going to catch the full aroma of that feast that's wafting and feel the invitation to sit at banquet table with God in the Kingdom of Heaven and feast with him forever and ever.

So if you have faith in Christ, you can smell that aroma coming from the text, from the banquet today, and that's what I want you to do. I want you to have that faith, to smell the fragrance of that banquet. I think of all the great banquets you've ever had. For me, I think about Thanksgiving when you eat it way too much, and I think about my mom and dad, they both work together, cooking. They're both good cooks, and my father there, he was a chemist, he would wear this white lab coat and working very seriously in the kitchen. I remember the look on his face and just doing an exquisite and very technical job cooking for us. And it was just really well done. And my mom too working and just the aromas of the pies and of the turkey was getting carefully basted and eventually the gravy and all of it just wafting from the kitchen, just makes your mouth water, and I want that to float from the text today because it speaks of a banquet that God is going to spread for us in the kingdom of heaven.

And I want us to see that. This is just an incredible chapter. It's a chapter of celebration. A chapter of joy and celebration. There's lots of judgment chapters in Isaiah. Isaiah 23, the judgment on Tyre and Sidon. Isaiah 24 the judgment on the whole world, the destruction of all the earth, but here in chapter 25, we have rich, full celebration. Celebration, I think ultimately of the resurrection victory of Jesus Christ, and so that's what we get to celebrate today, and I've prayed that God would give me grace to explain how my own heart has been captivated by this text. How for years I have longed to preach Isaiah 25. Now I get one chance to do it. Oh God, give me grace to not mess it up, that I might speak with the joy, the energy, the life that's in my heart that reduced me to tears this morning, and that's gonna be of no use while I'm preaching. So it's gone, thank God for that, but the passion behind it of celebrating the resurrection, victory and the feast that we will have in heaven. That's my desire today.

There are four awesome things that are celebrated in this chapter with incredible clarity. First God's sovereign plan, formed, fashioned before the creation of the world is celebrated in Isaiah 25. Formed in the mind of God, before the creation of the world. Second, God's astonishing power to convert and to transform ruthless nations of tyrants and oppressors, to transform them and convert them, so that they will praise him and submit to him and celebrate his glory. God's power to do that. Third, Jesus's marvelous victory over death and the grave. His power over death is celebrated in this chapter. Fourth, God's terrifying power to bring down nations and individuals who will not yield to his rule, to crush them down to the very dust. These are the great things that Isaiah 25 celebrates. So let's look right away at verses one through five. Praise God.

 Look at verses one through five. "Oh Lord, you are my God. I will exalt you and praise your name, for in perfect faithfulness, you have done marvelous things. Things planned long ago. You have made the city a heap of rubble, fortified town of ruin. The foreigners strong hold a city no more. It will never be rebuilt. Therefore, strong peoples will honor you, cities of ruthless nations will revere you. you have been a refuge for the poor, refuge for the needy in his distress, a shelter from the storm and a shade from the heat. For the breath of the ruthless is like a storm driving against a wall, and like the heat of the desert. You silence the uproar of foreigners as heat is reduced by the shadow of a cloud. So the song of the ruthless is stilled."

 So I begin by just saying this, God does everything for the praise of his glory. Everything he does, he does for the praise of his glory. I love the beginning of Piper's book, 'Let the Nations Be Glad'. A great book on missions. And he says there, "Missions is not the ultimate goal of the church. Worship is. Missions exist because worship doesn't. Worship is ultimate, not missions, because God is ultimate, not man. And when this age is over and the countless millions of the redeemed fall on their faces before the throne of God, missions will be no more. It is a temporary necessity. But worship abides forever."

So God does everything he does so that individual people will praise him for his glory. Ephesians 1 makes this very plain. In Ephesians 1, it says in verses 4-6, "In love, he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ in accordance with his pleasure and will". Listen to this, "To the praise of His glorious grace". So predestination is for praise. Again, in the same chapter, Ephesians 1 in verse 12, "In order that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory". And then again in verse 14, speaking of converts, they also converted to the praise of his glory. So that's three times in 10 verses, it speaks of the reason why God does everything, and that is for the praise of his glory. And so Isaiah 25 has a marvelous tone of praise for almighty God, that's why my outline is praise God for this, praise God for that, and praise God for the other. Everything is just celebration in this chapter, just praise him, give him glory. But it must be done by individuals, it's done by people, by individual human beings, and so there's a very individualized personal aspect of praise right from the start here. 

Look at verse 1, "O Lord, you are my God; I will exalt you and praise your name, for imperfect faithfulness you have done marvelous things, things planned long ago". Now, Isaiah chapters 13-39, as we've been saying, just shows the sovereign power of Almighty God. The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob over all the earth. He rules over all nations. Rules over Babylon all the way to Assyria. So Isaiah 13, God sovereignty over Babylon is a Isaiah 37, 38, 39, his victory over Syria and in between lots and lots of smaller nations and oracles against them, Arabia, Syria, Damascus, Ethiopia, Egypt, all of these God rules over all of them. Tyre and Sidon, God rules over mighty nations, and we proclaimed and will see in Isaiah 40, how God sits and throne above the circle of the earth, and all the nations before him are like grasshoppers, and the nations are just a drop from the bucket.

So we have this infinite sense of the majesty of God, how great he is, how mighty and how powerful. But we should never lose sight of the fact that God does this so that he might be known individually and personally by people just like you and me. By individual people created in the image of God. That he might have a relationship with us individually. I think this is exactly why Jesus, for the most part, I think, sought to heal people through face-to-face contact though he literally could have cured the whole world of all of its diseases with one word. If he wanted to. But he wanted face-to-face contact like the woman who was bleeding and touched the hem of his garment, he stopped and says, "Okay, who touched me?", he wants that encounter with you, he wants a relationship with you. He wants an intimate relationship. And so it's very, very personal here. 

Isaiah makes his love for God personal. "O Lord, you are my God". Can you say that? Can you say that the God of the Bible is your God? Can you speak with that kind of intensity, that kind of personal love? That this God who sits enthroned above the circle of the earth, this one who cups his hand and scoops up the Pacific Ocean, that kind of thing, who weighs the mountains and it balances as though they were dust on the scales. This great God is your God. And you talk to him every day. And you live your life in front of him before him by faith. You get this in Psalm 139, don't you? Where the psalmist David said, "Oh Lord, you have searched me and you know me. You know, when I sit and when I rise, you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my coming back in, you're familiar with all of my ways". And at the end of the Psalm, he says, "Do that, keep doing that. I want you to search me, I want you to know me, I wanna be intimate with you God". 

Or again, the apostle Paul in Galatians 2:20, who knew very well that there would be a countless multitude from every tribe and language and people and nation, for whom Jesus died, huge, huge, multitude of people, vast sea of humanity that Jesus shed his blood for. But he gets very, very personal in Galatians 2:20 when he says, "I have been crucified with Christ. And I no longer live but Christ lives in me, and the life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me. And gave himself for me." Not loved us and gave himself for us. That's true, that's not what he said there. Loved me, and gave himself for me. Very, very personal. So Isaiah begins this incredible chapter intensely, personally, "Oh God, you are my God, and I will exalt you and I will praise your name". Well, why is he praising Him? What is the reason why Isaiah praises him? Well, he says, "I will exalt you and praise your name for in perfect faithfulness you have done marvelous things, things planned long ago". That's the topic of his praise, that's why he is intensely praising God here. 

In his wisdom God, before he said, "Let there be light", had worked out a detailed sovereign plan for the entire history of the human race. It was all worked out before God said, "Let there be light". I mean down to the tiniest detail, down to the sparrow falling to the ground, down to the dice being cast into the lap, and it's every decision coming up the way God wanted. He had it all absolutely, completely worked out. He had figured out what path would be, would tend for his ultimate end in creating the universe, and what was that, that we would all be for the praise of his glory. And so he worked out an ancient plan before the foundation of the world, and now Isaiah is praising God that he's working it out, he's actually doing it. I'm praising you because the plan you thought about before, you said let there be light, you're doing it now it's happening.

It's going on. And so this sovereign plan, which is Isaiah 14, celebrate, Isaiah 14:26-27, this is the planned plan determined for the whole world. This is the hand stretched out over all nations, for the Lord Almighty has purposed and who can thwart him. His hand is stretched out and who can turn it back. Well, the center piece of that sovereign plan is the salvation of the elect from every tribe and language and people and nation. That's the centerpiece of God's plan. Ephesians 1:11, "In him, we were also chosen, having been predestined, according to the plan of Him, who works out everything, in conformity with the purpose of His will. In order that we who are the first and hope first to open Christ might be for the praise of His glory."

So here, Isaiah is astonished by the marvelous things, the wonderful things that God's plan includes. They're like miracles to him. In this particular case, in these verses, he's celebrating the fact that God has the power to turn ruthless, oppressive, tyrannical, empire-building human beings, into meek, humble, lamb-like followers of Jesus. He actually has the power to do that. And that's marvelous, isn't it? It's marvelous. That God has that kind of power to do that. So he's working it out, it says, in perfect faithfulness, he's working out his plan. He knows what He's trying to do, and he is doing it in perfect faithfulness. He's not swerving to the left or to the right. "The Lord Almighty has sworn," Isaiah 14, "Surely as I have planned so it will be, and as I have purposed, so it will stand." Isn't that wonderful? Doesn't that just bring peace to your hearts? "As I have purposed so it will be.” And nothing can stop it. So he's marvelous. God's plan is marvelous. It's a miracle, salvation, former enemies, Gentile nations whose bloody boots tramped the surface of the earth and came down on the necks of cowering people. They are stripped of their pride. Their own walls crumble, and humbled, but still alive, they then turned to the God who struck them and find salvation in Him. It’s marvelous!

 Praise God for that. So we have here the crushing of the city of rebellion, the city of man, look at verse two, "You have made the city a heap of rubble. The fortified town, a ruin, the foreigners stronghold a city no more. It will never be rebuilt." So this is the crushing of the city of man. Now we come again and again to this concept of the city of man versus the city of God. We have city, city, city, almost every chapter mentions the city, and we're not sure what city it is, so it ends up just kind of floating above and just becoming a symbol for the city of man. What Augustine wrote about in the 5th century as Rome, what the pagans called the eternal city. Jerome thought with the fall of Rome came the end of the world. Well, Jerome, apparently has been wrong by about 16 centuries at least. But he thought, you know, with the fall of Rome, the end of the world was imminent.

Augustine saw a little bit further. He said, "No, this is just another human city that's falling. It's been going on for a long time." Significant moment when Alaric and the Visigoths went running through the streets of Rome burning and looting and doing different things. It was a big moment, no doubt about that. But he wrote City of God at that point to say, "You know what's really going on? Is the advancement of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the building of the City of God, the Eternal City." Charted out before the foundation of the world to evangelism and missions, the advance of the gospel, that's the building of the City of God. City of Man rises and falls.

So as human beings gathered together in one big metropolis and they put walls around them, and they think that those walls make them safe and secure, and they trust in those walls and they trust in their power, and then they do well and their harvests come in and all their needs are met, and they started developing military technology, and they start to move out like a river and conquer unwalled villages and take advantage of weaker peoples and start to build an empire. That's just the City of Man, friends, that's what it is.

And in verse two, God brings it down, brings it down to the ground. He just turns the walls into a pile of rubble. He has the power to do that, and therefore, in this verse, in verse three, it results in conversion. It results in salvation for those tyrants. At the end of the chapter, for some represented by Moab, it's going to result in condemnation, destruction and judgment under the wrath of God, but here it results in salvation for some. Look at verse three, "Therefore, because you have turned the city into a heap of rubble because of that, therefore, people, strong peoples, will honor you. Cities of ruthless nations will revere you." Do you see that? That language is language of worship. These strong peoples will worship the God who did this to them.

This is the story of the world, friends, is the story what God can do. It's a story of the Book of Daniel. It's a story of Belshazzar's feast and Babylon coming down that very night, fallen, fallen is Babylon the great. So God has the power to do that, but in the midst of it, he can save out a remnant even of Babylonian tyrant oppressors, like Nebuchadnezzar, before that, converted, saved. Turned into a humble... I remember how God dealt with him and how he turned his mind from sharp and clear and arrogant and pride filled to that of a beast grazing for seven years. I've often wondered who found him first in that condition, which of his counselors came. Said, "Now we've got some things for you to sign," and he mooed back. Said, "Okay." A year later, they had a cycle of who was going to feed him and water him.

 Okay, but at that early stage, I mean, just what has happened to the king? But God had a plan for him, he didn't kill him. He didn't kill him. He kept him alive for seven years, and at the end of the seven years, he converted him. He gave him back, not the mind he had before, a whole different attitude now. Daniel 4:34-35, "At the end of that time, I, Nebuchadnezzar, raised my eyes toward heaven and I praised the God of Heaven. My sanity was restored and I praised the Most High. I honored and glorified Him who lives forever. His dominion is an eternal dominion. His kingdom endures from generation to generation. All the peoples of the earth are regarded as nothing. He does as he pleases with the people, the powers of Heaven, and the peoples of the earth. No one can hold back his hand or say to him, what have you done?"

No, that's a conversion, friends. You can't write those words and not know the saving grace of God. Or again, think of the power of God and transforming a vicious, murderous man, a religious Zealot, like Saul of Tarsus, who's breathing out murderous threats against the Lord's disciples, and going from place to place and dragging off men and women. And throwing them in prison, hardening his heart to their cries. Then he's on the road to Damascus with letters from the high priest to arrest any that he might find there who are followers of Jesus. Then suddenly, suddenly a light, a blinding light, flashed from heaven, and he fell to the ground, and he heard a voice calling his name. Calling him by name, "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?", "Who are you, Lord?" he called back, "You know who I am. [laughter] I am Jesus. I am Jesus, the very one you're persecuting. Now get up and go into the city, and you'll be told what you must do." That's a king giving him orders. And he says later, "I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision." He converted this man, this murderer, this evil man converted, and so examples from church history abound. He did it to the Romans, did it to the Romans, three centuries of the gospel, the gospel taking Rome on and winning. Amen. Winning by martyrdom, by the blood of the martyrs, the seed for the church. The Gospel won. At the end of Rome, the gospel was standing and Rome wasn't. Amen.

And think about the barbarian tribes, think about the Tribes of Germania, think about Boniface the missionary to them. He goes up to the northern woods of Thuringian, and he preaches, and he finds there a sacred oak, the Jupiter Oak, that they're all bowing down in their worshipping, and he says, "Chop it down." Actually, he begins to chop it down himself. Now that's a bold mission work right there. And the people are like, "All right, should we kill him? No, no, let's let Thor kill him or let Jupiter kill him." Well, Thor didn't do it. Actually, what God did is send a mighty, miraculous wind that blew the tree down, that's what the story says. The tree gets knocked down mid-stroke. Takes a long time to chop down an oak tree with an ax, and then Boniface up on the stump and preaches the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Amen. And then builds a church from the wood.

I just love that. But these are violent, militaristic, conquering people that are subdued by the gospel. Think about the Vikings, who go from place to place, coming on their dragon ships, coming out of the mist, and just stealing from monasteries, stealing gold and silver and burning the books, the Bibles, burning them because they meant nothing to them. Give it another century or two, and they are also converted by the gospel. It's awesome, this story. And Isaiah found it awesome, didn't he in this chapter? He says, "I praise you, O God, 'cause you can do this. You can turn mighty conquering people into humble, meek, lowly converts, you can do that. In the meantime, you can also protect your people who are cowering under their oppressive boot." Look at verses four and five, "You have been a refuge for the poor. A refuge for the needy. In his distress, a shelter from the storm and a shade from the heat. For the breath of the ruthless is like a storm driving against a wall, and like the heat of the desert, you silence the uproar of foreigners as heat is reduced by the shadow of a cloud so the song of the ruthless is stilled."

So while the oppressors are in their heyday, an awful lot of innocent people get killed, a lot of innocent people get crushed. And these verses give the promise of refuge and protection for God, for God's people, because for the most part, God's people have been the oppressed. They have been the minority in that society. They have been flotsam and jetsam on the wave of history. We've not been, for the most part, in charge of it, but actually carried along by it. And so the dominators, the animals, the beasts of the earth, have crushed, for the most part, God's people, and sent them to heaven. And many martyrs were made, but in the midst of that, God is a refuge for them, and he protects them from this onslaught, this storm of tyrannical oppression, like the breath, hot breath like a desert wind, beating against the wall, the wall of the city, pushing on it until it falls. And God was the refuge for that. 

It's like a storm coming down. I picture like a hailstorm. Last year, I was out in the western part of this state and I was riding my bicycle, a mountain bike, up switchback mountain, a dirt road, and going up. And suddenly the weather got very, very interesting, very interesting. Windy, cloudy, then it got electrical and lots of thunder, lots of lightning, and then came the hail. Now, that's when I got interested. The hail. Little marbles, marbles of ice pelting me. The arms were tough. On my arms, that was bad, but the worst part was the little chunks of ice that got in the cracks of my helmet and stayed there and gave me a brain freeze. You know what I'm saying? They just melted in these cracks and it was awful, but I'm getting pelted, so there's only one thing I wanted in that moment, one thing, I wanted refuge. I wanted refuge. I was looking, and I couldn't find it, actually, I couldn't find any place that wasn't getting pelted. Leaves, shredded leaves, were all over the place by this pelting hailstorm.

So I said, "The best thing for me to just go down the mountain." I started riding, it was one of the hardest rides of my life looking for shelter. These verses, verses four and five, talk about how God is a shelter for his defenseless people in the midst of the onslaught of this tyranny. So, verses one through five, Isaiah celebrates God's sovereign power as ruthless, tyrannical, empire builders tromp on the earth, and how God eventually brings some of them low, and saves them, and converts them. But you know there's a more powerful enemy even than these tyrant oppressors. And verses six through nine deal with that one directly, and that's the enemy of death. What 1 Corinthians 15 calls the final enemy. There has been no enemy of God's people that has been as cold-hearted and ruthless as this enemy, death. Death cares nothing for human affections, cares nothing for the age of its victims, for the marital status of them, how long the couple's been married, cares nothing for that. Cold-hearted tyrant. That's death. Cold-hearted tyrant, and an enemy in 1 Corinthians 15. 

In verses, six through nine celebrates, praise of God for death destruction. That's what it's all about. Praise God for death being swallowed up in victory. Look at verses six through nine, "On this mountain, the Lord Almighty will prepare a banquet, or feast of rich foods, for all peoples, a banquet of aged wine, the best of meats and the finest of wines. On this mountain, he will destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples. The sheet that covers all nations. He will swallow up death forever. The sovereign Lord will wipe away the tears from all faces. He will remove the disgrace of his people from all the earth. The Lord has spoken." In verse nine, "In that day, they will say, behold, this is our God, we trusted in him and he saved us. This is the Lord, we trusted in him, let us rejoice and be glad in his salvation." These are some of the sweetest verses in the Book of Isaiah for me. When I went through this book and was memorizing years ago, this chapter arrested me because I'd never seen it before, I never noticed these verses before. But the apostle Paul noticed them and took a phrase and put it over in 1 Corinthians 15. We'll talk about that in a minute.

But let's talk about this banquet. Let's talk about this feast that the Lord Almighty will spread. How is it described? There's just lush language for this banquet, it's a feast of rich foods. It's a banquet of aged wine. The best of meats and the finest of wines, the NIV gives us. That's a good translation. It's just the highest quality experience you can ever have at a banquet, and this is where I desire that in some way, this message could be the aroma of life unto life for you. That you could just smell this banquet, the sweetness of the aroma wafting from God's table. It's a rich banquet.

Now scripture portrays a number of rich feasts. Many people in the world never get to sit at a rich feast or banquet. They're poor and so they never have that experience, maybe. And so there are stories in the Bible of rich feasts that are spread and you can read about it at least... Or use your imagination to think about what that's like. For example, 1 Kings 10, King Solomon puts on a banquet for the Queen of Sheba. Remember that one? She came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon's wisdom. And when the Queen of Sheba saw all the wisdom of Solomon, and the palace that he had built, and the food on his table, the seating of his officials, his attending servants in their robes, and his cupbearers and the burnt offerings he made at the temple of the Lord, it says literally, there was no breath left in her. Her breath was taken away. 

Well, friends, this banquet will be better than Solomon's banquet, amen. As Jesus would say, "And now a banquet greater than Solomon's is here." Or again you get the same thing in Esther chapter 1, where King Xerxes opens up the splendor of the empire from Kush, that's Ethiopia, all the way to India, 120 provinces, for 180 days, and just shows the glory of his kingdom, and it culminates in a seven-day banquet described in Esther chapter 1. "The king gave a banquet lasting seven days in the enclosed garden of the king's palace for all the people, from the least to the greatest who are in the citadel of Susa." That's the picture of heaven, is the picture of the new Jerusalem. Everybody from the least of the greatest will sit at the King's table. 

"The garden had hangings of white and blue linen fastened with cords of white linen and purple material to silver rings on marble pillars. There were couches of gold and silver on a mosaic pavement of porphyry, marble, mother-of-pearl, and other costly stones. Wine was served in goblets of gold, and each one was different from the other, and the royal wine was abundant in keeping with the king's liberality. And by the king's command, each guest was allowed to drink in his own way, for the king instructed all the wine stewards to serve each man as he wished." It's just a foretaste of heaven, that language. So these are rich banquets, but this feast of Isaiah 25 is infinitely greater than any of those.

All right, where is the location of the banquet? Where is God going to prepare it? Well, the text says, "On this mountain, he will do it." Well, what is this mountain? I think to go to the very end of chapter 24, the last verse, right before 25, and I think we get the mountain described. Isaiah 24:23, it says, "The moon will be abashed and the sun ashamed, for the Lord Almighty will reign on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem and before its elders gloriously." So that's the end of the world, as I say, because chapter 24 is talking about the destruction of all the earth. And so Mount Zion... What is Mount Zion? I've thought a lot about Mount Zion over the last year. And I just continue to evolve in my understanding of it. The way I understand it is Mount Zion is the place where God dwells in the midst of his people. And the symbolic aspect of that is the Shekinah Glory of God, the glory cloud descending and staying in the tabernacle or the temple as a symbol of God dwelling in the midst of his people. It came to represent, for the most part, Jerusalem, the city of God, the city as he dwelt among men. It isn't just where God dwells like up in heaven, but it's where God dwells with people.

And so it came to kind of be synonymous for Jerusalem. And so Mount Zion was the mountain on which Jerusalem was built. But ultimately, theologically, the place where God Almighty dwells amongst his people. And so on this mountain, I think, refers to Jerusalem, first and foremost. So on this mountain, what we know as Mount Zion, there he will spread a feast. Friends, it's the same mountain where Jesus died. It's the same mountain where God told Abraham to take his son, Isaac, and offer him as a burnt offering, Mount Moriah. The same place where David at the end of the plague, built the temple, wanted to build the temple on the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite. On that mountain, on that place, death will be defeated. That's where it's going to happen. On this mountain, he will spread this banquet, this very same place.

 Okay, well, the feast is described. The one who spreads it is God Almighty. The location is Mount Zion and that will be fulfilled ultimately, when the new Jerusalem comes down, like a bride beautifully dressed for her husband, and it's all going to be together, the new Jerusalem there we will dwell, and that's where the feast ultimately will be. Well, who's invited? Who's going to come? Well, here we see the guests are all peoples. Do you see that? People from every nation and tribe are invited. This is very, very plain in the text, 25:6, it says, "On this mountain, the Lord Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples." Do you see that? Verse seven, "On this mountain, he will destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that covers all nations."

 Verse eight, "The sovereign Lord will wipe away the tears from all faces. He will remove the disgrace of his people, his people, from all the earth." Friends, these are the elect from every tribe and language and people and nations who are invited to this banquet. That's who's coming. This is universal language. A wide reach; the wide reach of this feast. Jesus spoke of it in Matthew chapter 8, in verse 11, "I tell you that many will come from the east and the west and will take their places at the feast with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the Kingdom of Heaven”.

Jesus spoke about it again, on the night before he was crucified. He said, "I tell you, I'll not drink this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink and drink it anew with you in my Father's Kingdom," when we sit down and we have that feast of the best of meats and the finest of wines. Now, I wrote in my outline here, the center of the banquet: "The swallowing up of death forever." I've changed, this morning I changed. Okay. An important feature of the banquet is the swallowing up of death forever. Center is another place. We'll get to that at verse nine. But an important feature of this banquet is the swallowing up of death forever. Death is portrayed as the enemy of all peoples of all nations. All of us descended from Adam are under the death penalty. In Adam, when Adam sinned at the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil when he took that fruit and ate, we all sinned. Romans 5 says that. And in him, his death penalty came on us all, so every human infant born, is born seen to be a sinner in God's sight, and under the death penalty. It's universal. 

Sin reigns in death like a cold-hearted tyrant. It's personified there in Romans 5:21, "Sin reigns in death." And so there's this link between sin and death. And Isaiah depicts it as a shroud that covers all people, a sheet that enfolds all nations. You get the picture of a quiet, like a corpse laid out on a slab, like in a morgue. In a movie, when they're working, working, then they just pause and then they pull the sheet over the face. You know what that means. You know what that means. Person's dead. There's nothing more to do. Go by an accident, if you were to see somebody completely covered up, you know. They're not scrambling, they're not trying to get them to the hospital. There's nothing more to be done.

So death is the shroud. It's the sheet. And it's universal. It's a universal threat. People in China, people in Indonesia, people in Australia, people in Africa, people here in North America, rich, poor, it's everywhere. It's a shroud that enfolds all peoples. And the sovereign Lord is going to destroy it. And it speaks specifically here of the sorrow of death and the disgrace of death. Look at verse eight, "The sovereign Lord will wipe away the tears from all faces. He will remove the disgrace of his people from all the earth." So death with its ability to destroy our bodies through aging and corruption and decay, and then when you die, when you stop breathing, then the microbes take over and the worms take over and the parasites take over. And it's disgusting. And so it was said to Jesus, if we open the door, there'll be a bad odor, for corruption has taken over. There is a dishonor in this. There is a disgrace in death, and you feel it when you go to the ICU and people are strapped to machines and they can't breathe, except with a machine. There's a disgrace, a dishonor to it. And so it says here in the verse, "He will remove the disgrace of His people." He'll take away their disgrace. So it says in 1 Corinthians 15, "The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable." It is sown in dishonor.

 No matter what you do at a funeral, no matter what you do at the grave side, there's still an inherent dishonor in it. It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power. How does God do this? He does it through Jesus. I wrote at the top of the sheet, preach Jesus right now. Don't preach Isaiah, preach Jesus. Through Jesus's shed blood on the cross, by him taking our penalty for our sins and by his death under the wrath of God, by his justifying work and by his mighty resurrection, he does this conquering, this conquest, this swallowing up of death. That's how it happens.

 To Jesus be the glory. And I love how it says he will swallow up death forever. Isn't that sweet? This isn't just a victory. There's some close victories, like eking out a victory by a one point. A buzzer beater. You know what I'm saying? Friends, this isn't a buzzer beater here. This is a trouncing. He is going to swallow up death forever. I picture here, Moses with his... remember his staff. And He says, "Throw it on the ground Moses," turns into a serpent. Right? Says, "Show that to Pharaoh." Remember what happened when he did that, you remember? So he throws it down and much to his chagrin, the magicians did the same thing. It's like, "Oh, I didn't know they could do that here in Egypt. God, what were you doing? I thought it was gonna be something impressive.", "Just be quiet and watch." So watch what happens, and Moses' snake swallowed up the wicked snakes of the oppressors. Swallowed it up. And so there was a little bit of mocking and it was silenced when that happened, and then he grabs the end of the tail and it turns into a staff again. Swallowed up.

It's awesome. So death will be crushed. Final score, final score, millions from every tribe, language, people, and nation to zero per death. Millions to zero. Because death will not say anything final over you or me. Amen. Death itself is gonna be thrown into the lake of fire, and I will live. And I will eat with God, and I will see his new heaven, new earth, and death will be a distant memory. And so Paul picks up on this in 1 Corinthians 15, and he says, "Then the saying that is written will come true, death has been swallowed up in victory. Where o death is your victory, where o death is your sting?" He starts to mock death. "What happened to you, o death? You were so powerful once. Look at you now. The sting of death is sin. And the power of sin is the law, but thanks be to God, he gives us the victory through Jesus Christ." And those words move me again, melted me, he gives us the victory. Jesus wins it, and then he says, here, you just sit down and eat my victory. Enjoy forever.

So death is gonna get swallowed up in the lake of fire. I picture here, like the Lord of the Rings, you guys remember the ring of power? If you don't know this, just tune out for the next minute with this illustration and then read the books, okay? Or watch the movies. But this ring of power represents the power of wickedness and evil and sin in the world, and it's all kind of into this ring, and the whole quest of the whole thing, three books, hours and hours, nine, 10 hours of movie-ness, and there's this ring. And then finally it gets thrown into the cracks of doom and this molten lava at the bottom, and you remember what happens? It just melts. And the whole evil kingdom of Mordor just comes crumbling down, like at the end of this chapter, just crumbling down, just reduced to nothing. 

Death is gonna get melted and swallowed up in the lake of fire. And so in Revelation 20:14, then death and hades are thrown in the lake of fire. And this is all done by Jesus. Jesus gives us the victory. All you have to do is repent, believe, trust, and he will be for you your resurrection victory. He will call to you out of the grave and you'll come out in a resurrection body and you will live forever. And so Isaiah 25:6-9, is predicting the awesome victory celebration at the end of the world. And verse eight, the very end, it says, "This is as certain as the Word of God." What it was the final phrase there, a final thing in verse eight: "The Lord has spoken." That just brings goosebumps to me. God's gonna do this. He's gonna do it. And nothing's gonna stop it.

And then what's gonna happen after that? Verse nine, then they're gonna praise. They're gonna praise and praise and praise forever. They will say, "Behold our God, behold our God. We trusted in him and he saved us. This is the Lord. We trusted in him, let us rejoice and be glad in his salvation." That is the center of the feast, and actually it's not even the center of the feast. Friends, it is the feast, every dish brought in and laid down is God. His attributes, his achievements in history, what he did for this brother and that sister, that man, and this little girl throughout history, what he has done will be the feast. God's creativity in the new heaven and the new earth, his gentleness, his power, his wisdom, that'll be the feast one dish after another, set before you and we will eat. God is the feast. God is the reward, God is the inheritance. He's what you get. 

"Come you who are blessed by my Father, take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world." Is it heresy to change it a little bit and say, "Come you who are blessed by my Father, take your inheritance, the king." He is the inheritance. He's what we get, we get Jesus, we get the greatness of God forever. And so, as Steve Green put it in God and God Alone, he said, "God and God alone will be the joy of our eternal home. He will be our one desire, our hearts will never tire of God and God alone, he will be the feast."

In the meantime, brothers and sisters around the world, they're suffering, verses 10 through 12. It's not the way I would have ended the chapter, I put great stuff at the end, you know. Chapters 10 through 12 talk about the judgment of those who will not submit to this message, represented by Moab: "The hand of the Lord will rest on this mountain, but Moab will be trampled under him as straw is trampled down in the manure. They will spread out their hands in it as a swimmer spreads out his hands to swim and God will bring down their pride despite the cleverness of their hands. He will bring down your high fortified cities or walls and lay them down. He will bring them down to the ground to the very dust."

This is God's wrath against arrogant unbelievers who will not submit. And at the beginning of the chapter, they get converted, these folks don't. The Bible doesn't teach universalism. Not everyone will sit at this banquet table. There are some rebels who will not yield, they will not bow the knee to King Jesus, represented by Moab here, but I think it's just all the reprobates, the ones who will not yield, who will not submit. And all of the language here is downward, they're gonna be trampled down, their pride is gonna be brought down, their walls are gonna be hurled down. It's all downward language. 

And no matter what they do with their clever schemes and their self-salvation schemes, they can't escape this judgment. And God will judge them. And so Jesus said, "Do not fear those who kill the body, and after that, there's nothing more they can do to you. I'll tell you who to fear: Fear the one who after the death of the body has power to destroy both soul and body in hell." The ultimate downward pressing under the judgment of God is in the lake of fire, it's in hell, and so the scripture warns us to flee the wrath to come, and to come to Christ.

So for our application, can I just invite you to the banquet. Just come, alright? Matthew 22, the message is going out, the king's messengers are on the roads right now, they're out there and they're telling everyone in the world. The wedding banquet of the King and his son has come. The King has prepared the banquet, the oxen and fattened cattle have been butchered and everything is ready. Come to the banquet. But in that parable, they paid no attention to, went off. One to his field, another to his business. Don't do that, come to Christ. Don't leave here unregenerate, don't leave here not sure if you're gonna sit at the table. All you have to do is look to Jesus and say, I'm a sinner, I need to be saved. Save me, you shed your blood for sinners like me, you rose again from the dead. Save me. It's all. And if you believed in Jesus years ago, you still believe in Him, but you're drifting, you're struggling, you're sorrowful, like in that song, there's misery and sadness, go to the empty tomb, look in it again, and feast. Say, Lord, would it be possible for a few extra morsels to fall from your eternal table down into my open mouth today? Can I get some foretaste of heavenly joy today?

Ask him for a down payment. A deposit from the Holy Spirit. Give me some heavenly feasting joy right now. Banqueting joy, give it to me. I'm depressed, I'm discouraged, I'm downtrodden by my sins, I'm feeling guilty. Would you please give me a foretaste of your mercy and your grace? Come to the banquet. And just celebrate. Just go home happy. Go home happy. Just be happy in Jesus. No long faces. I'm looking at you now. No long faces. If you're a Christian you should be happy. It's like, “Well, I don't have to be happy in front of the pastor.” No, that's... But some time today be happy. Okay, sometime today. Smile. Alright, don't do it for me 'cause you don't wanna... Fine, I get it. Just out of pride, I'm like that. When preachers tell me to do things, I tend to not do them. I want you to raise your hands, I'm not raising my hands, I'm not doing that. I'm not gonna do what I'm told here. But I'm just urging you. Be happy. Just ask the question, “Has Jesus done enough at the cross and the empty tomb to make you happy today?”

 Be happy then. Praise Him, praise God for his ability to convert people. Pray for unconverted oppressors. We live in a perilous time in our nation when people are voting God in and out, in and out. Sharing, booing God. Its sickening. Don't get angry, pray for people, pray for people who do those kinds of things. Pray that God would convert them. Don't you want them there at the banquet table with you? Pray for them, for our president, pray for other leaders, pray for them that they would sit at the banquet with Jesus and just wait on the Lord, wait for him. It says, "Surely this is our God, we waited for him". There's a lot of waiting. It's not just Larry in Atlanta waiting for Andy to get healed. We're all waiting, doing a lot of waiting. We're not freed from death, that's the final enemy, so we're gonna have to go to some funerals, we're gonna have to go through some suffering. And we need to wait on Him, but in the midst of that, let's rejoice at this resurrection victory. Close with me in prayer. 

Father, thank you for the things we've studied today, thank you for the joy that comes from it. Thank you for the delight in this chapter 25, potent, potent verses. Thank you for destroying the shroud that covered my face, taking that shroud off my face and saying, “No, you'll live, you're not gonna die. You will live and not die.” Thank you for saving me. Thank you for saving these brothers and sisters that are sharing this joy with me today, and those that aren't... That are in this room, that aren't sharing the joy right now, because they're unconverted. Oh God, speak to them now. Save them, please. We pray this in Jesus name, amen.

Pastor Andy Davis preaches a verse-by-verse expository sermon on Isaiah 24:1-23. The main subject of the sermon is the extent of God's righteous judgment.

We come this morning to Isaiah 24, which you heard John read a moment ago. It’s a truly awesome chapter, a chapter that proclaims plainly the end of the world. This world and all that we know in it is temporary. It will come to an end. Last evening, as I was going out with Calvin and Daphne to do a little errand, I wasn’t satisfied yet with the sermon. I was still thinking about applications. So I put in my iPhone and played the text, Isaiah 24. I prayed it. I played it in the NIV. I played it in the King James Version. I played it again in the ESV. It was sunset, and it was getting darker. I looked around and little by little, the more I listened to the text, the more awe came over me and this one central lesson: this world is going to come to an end.

Everything in it is temporary. All flesh is grass and all of the glory of man is like the grass of the field, the flower that shines, that is bright for a while, but then withers when the breath of the Lord blows on it. It’s all temporary. Specifically, I was thinking about applications. I was thinking, how then should we live if this world is temporary? We’ll get to that at the end, but little by little I started seeing what an explosive thought this is. We as Christians, as Bible believers, we are those that have this message, this apocalyptic message. This world is going to come to an end. There will be an Omega Day. It will not be like this forever. It has nothing to do with the Mayan calendar, December 21, 2012, or any of that kind of stuff. Friends, just because there are false warnings and false doctrines does not mean the truth can be removed. Isaiah 24 says very plainly that this world will come to an end.

And so we come to an awesome section of the Book of Isaiah. We reach the end of a major subsection. Isaiah 13 through 23 was the oracles against the nations. Isaiah the prophet speaks one message or oracle of warning after another to the nations. And the message is clear. The Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, is ruler of all the earth. He is the sovereign king of all nations. He can utter through Isaiah the prophet oracles concerning Babylon; concerning Damascus, the capital of Syria; Moab; the Philistines; Egypt; Ethiopia; and Arabia; Jerusalem and Judah. He can speak against the city of Tyre one oracle after another. But now He’s going to sum it all up. We turn a corner a bit with Isaiah 24 through 27. This really kind of is the capstone, these four chapters, the capstone of this entire section.

Isaiah 24 speaks of God’s judgment coming generally on the whole earth. Isaiah 25 through 27 deals with the joy and delight of the righteous in the salvation of God. Isaiah 25 talks about the delight and the feast that the Lord will spread for all nations. We will talk about this, God willing, next week, and about the destruction of death, that God is going to swallow up death forever. Then Isaiah 26 is a hymn of thanksgiving for those that have been delivered, a hymn of praising God. We have salvation as a fortress, strong walls that surround us, and we can celebrate. Isaiah 27 speaks of the redemption of Israel, of God’s people, and how the fruitfulness of God’s people will reach to the ends of the earth. That’s where we’re heading. But today we have a look at a very complex, deep, powerful, and detailed chapter.

It covers the destruction of the whole earth and the establishment of God’s open reign in Jerusalem, in Zion, at the end of the chapter, gloriously. Because of the themes that are in this chapter, it’s sometimes called Isaiah’s Apocalypse. Now, I agree that those themes are in this chapter. Overarching, that’s what this chapter is about. But I also think that there are applications in every generation from Isaiah 24.  There are many judgments laid out that I think are described in this chapter. So let me open to you, again, one of my major pillars of understanding eschatology, or the doctrine of future things, the study of future things. I believe that there are many dress rehearsals in history for the final drama that will happen right before the return of Christ. I get this from Matthew 24:37. Jesus said, “As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.” As it was, so it will be. What you have already seen, you will see again one more time, or maybe, to a lower level, many, many times.

I think in Isaiah 24 we see depicted judgments, plural, of God on the wickedness of man on the whole surface of the earth, all over the world. Because of human sin, in Isaiah 24 humanity, the human race, is likened to a walled city. Look at verse 10. “The ruined city lies desolate; the entrance to every house is barred.” Again, in verse 12, “The city is left in ruins, its gate is battered to pieces.” We’re going to see this theme again and again. Many times over the next few weeks, I’m going to mention Saint Augustine’s great work, “The City of God” which depicts the City of God and the City of Man, kind of competing visions of human history. The City of God is the kingdom of Christ, that advancing kingdom of Christ, which will come to consummation at the end of the world with the New Jerusalem coming and the new heaven, the new earth, the City of God. It’s already here now. It’s growing and developing through the advance of the gospel.

The City of Man then represents the sum total of human society and experience, the world in city terms. Now I think it’s more and more understandable for us as we see history develop, why God uses this term “city.” In the year 2008, census takers tell us that for the first time over 50% of the human race dwelled in urban settings. That number is actually only going to increase. They think that by the year 2050, over 70% of the human race will be in cities. But whether in an urban setting or rural, still the city image is all-encompassing for the human race. Isaiah 24 depicts the fall, I think, again and again and again of aspects of the City of Man, usually by people invading them and destroying them.

 In the 5th century, when Attila the Hun was sweeping through Europe and destroying one village, one town, one walled city after another, he was called the scourge of God. He was seen to be a judgment of God. So also were the Vikings, in their time, in the 10th century. Then Genghis Khan and the Mongol horde swept across the earth in the 13th century, conqueror after conqueror sweeping in to batter gates and walls down and come in and bring terror to the populus. People giving up joy and music and revelry because the day of their death has come. The Day of Judgment has come and they’re cowering behind the closed doors of their houses. But this doesn’t in any way mean that there will not be one final cataclysm at the end of the world. There will be. It will be resolved by an invasion. But not an earthly invasion, dear friends, an invasion from heaven. An army of glory from heaven, and Jesus Christ himself, the righteous King of Kings and Lord of Lords, will ride at the head of that army. He will sweep down and He will take on the antichrist, the beast and his armies.

It says in Revelation 19:19 that the beast and the kings of the earth will have arrayed themselves against the Lord and against His anointed one, to take Him on. No chance, dear friends, no chance. Jesus will come back and He will rule them with a rod of iron. He will sweep them away and destroy them with the sword coming out of His mouth. Thus, this phase of human history will come to an end. I believe Isaiah 24 covers that as well, the destruction of the earth because of the wickedness of human sin.

Let’s look at verses 1-6, the judgments of God on the whole earth. “Behold, the Lord is going to lay waste the earth and devastate it; he will ruin its face and scatter its inhabitants – it will be the same for the priest as for people, for master as for servant, for mistress as for maid, for seller as for buyer, for borrower as for lender, for debtor as for creditor. The earth will be completely laid waste and totally plundered. The Lord has spoken this word. The earth dries up and withers, the world languishes and withers, the exalted of the earth languish. The earth is defiled by its people; they have disobeyed the laws, violated the statutes and broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore a curse consumes the earth; its people must bear their guilt. Therefore earth’s inhabitants are burned up, and very few are left.” We see God’s judgments extending to all the nations, the whole earth. “Behold the Lord is going to lay waste the earth,” he says, “and devastate it; he will ruin its face and scatter its inhabitants.” These are extreme statements made concerning the future of the planet that we live on. It begins with some dramatic words in the Hebrew, two words: “Behold the Lord.” Behold the Lord. When I think of the word “behold,” I think of it like in the apocalypse or Revelation, an unveiling, something that can be seen only by faith. You can’t see the events of Isaiah 24 with your own eyes. You have to see it by faith.

The ministry of the Word of God comes in here to take away the veil from the eyes of our hearts so that we may see two great things. We may see the Lord, “Behold the Lord, the greatness of his character and his holiness and his sovereign power.” Behold the Lord. We may also see the future. “Behold the future, behold what is coming.” We can only see these by faith. Through the power of the ministry of the Word of God, you trust in the word to cause the veil to come back off of your eyes, so that you can see what you cannot see with your normal sight, only by the eyes of faith. So, behold the Lord. We’re going to see God’s sovereign power, this display of awesome power by the holy judge of all the earth.

He’s going to lay waste, it says, to the entire earth. He’s going to devastate its inhabitants. So God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of Israel, as He’s called even in this chapter, is not merely a tribal deity. He’s not just the God of the Jews. He’s the God of all the earth. He’s going to bring judgments on all the earth. Yes, there have been ten oracles against specific nations, but they’re just a sampling. God rules over all the earth. He has planned judgments on this planet. He will lay waste the earth. He will devastate it. He will ruin its face. He will scatter its inhabitants. Verse 3 says, “The earth will be completely laid waste and totally plundered.” Look down at verses 18-20. It says, “The foundations of the earth shake. The earth is broken up, the earth is split asunder, the earth is thoroughly shaken. The earth reels like a drunkard, it sways like a hut in the wind; so heavy upon it is the guilt of its rebellion that it falls – never to rise again.”

This is a judgment on the whole earth for the wickedness and sins of man. This solid earth, this rock under our feet as we walk, this pull of gravity, pulls us down and the earth feels solid under our feet. Jesus even likened it to building on a rock that cannot move and that’s the ministry of the Word of God. But the Word, in its fullness, tells us that even the earth is going to be shaken and laid waste. So in some sense, we ask, “Where does God get this kind of power? The God of the Jews can do this to all the earth? Where did this power come from?” Friends, go back to the beginning of the Bible to know the answer to that question. Genesis 1:1-2 says, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and void.” Jeremiah, teaching the same kind of doctrine here, actually says that the judgments of the earth go back to creation. Jeremiah 4:23-26, “I looked at the earth, and it was formless and empty; and at the heavens, and their light was gone. I looked at the mountains, and they were quaking; all the hills were swaying. I looked, and there were no people; every bird in the sky had flown away. I looked, and the fruitful land was a desert; all its towns lay in ruins before the Lord, before his fierce anger.” God gets this kind of power because He created it all to begin with. He is the creator of the ends of the earth and He is the judge of the ends of the earth. He has this kind of power.

The judgment is universal. No one will escape. Look at verse 2. “It will be the same for priest as for people, for master as for servant, for mistress as for maid, for seller as for buyer, for borrower as for lender, for debtor as for creditor.” The high and mighty of society will come under this judgment, so also the meek and lowly. It will be the same for the high as for the low. Everyone is under the gaze of this holy God. This is the great leveling of society. All social roles will be gone. It doesn’t matter whether you are a king or a pauper. It doesn’t make a difference if you are the mighty of the earth or the weak of the earth. It’s the same for everybody, the verse says. There’s no escape. God is not impressed at all by our positions. He’s not impressed at all by our talents or our achievements. None of it is impressive to Him at all.

Verse 4 says, “The earth dries up and withers, the world languishes and withers, the exalted of the earth languish.” Why? Why this judgment on everyone? Why this judgment on the planet itself? The answer is very plain: because of human sin, because of our sins, dear friends. You want to know an application for this sermon? Stop sinning. That’s really what it is. Hate sin. Fight it. Be pure and holy. I’ll get to it again at the application section. That’s the application. The end of everything is coming so be holy like the God who’s going to bring the judgment. That’s the application. It’s because of wickedness and sin that this is coming. Look at verses 5-6. “The earth is defiled by its people; they have disobeyed the laws, violated the statutes and broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore a curse consumes the earth; its people must bear their guilt. Therefore the earth’s inhabitants are burned up, and very few are left.”

The judgments of the earth come on the people because of our sins, because of wickedness. Isaiah says that the earth is defiled or polluted by its people. He specifically cites the rebellion against God’s laws and statutes. He says, “They have broken the everlasting covenant.” Now, what is this? What is this everlasting covenant? A covenant is an agreement between two or more persons. It has certain stipulations and requirements, certain benefits that come. That’s a covenant. God makes many covenants in the Bible. What is this covenant? How have the people of the earth broken it? How have they broken this everlasting covenant? Some scholars think this is referring to the covenant of Noah. That after the flood, after the universal flood, God made a covenant with the people, and in that covenant, He said He would never again destroy the world by a flood.

There’s also some implication of a moral requirement. “If any man sheds blood, by man shall his blood be shed.” There’s a sense of moral reform. So the scholars say this is the everlasting covenant, the covenant with Noah. And it may be. There are other covenants, like the covenant with David, for example, that He would set one of David’s descendants on His throne forever. But there’s nothing for us to violate about that. It’s a unilateral covenant that God’s making with David. There’s the Mosaic covenant, but that was for the Jewish nation. It could definitely be violated. It could definitely be broken. But it was not an everlasting covenant. As a matter of fact, the Book of Hebrews tells us it was temporary, obsolete and aging. It would soon disappear. That’s not everlasting. For me, I’m going to go with something that’s never called directly a covenant in the Bible. I think it has to do with the moral code written by God on the heart of every human being. This is referred to in Romans 2:15, where it says very plainly, “[Gentiles] show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts now accusing, now even defending them.”

So the basic sense of moral uprightness, of right and wrong, is grafted into, or imprinted on our hearts at creation. It is imprinted by the fact that we’re created in the image of God and the fact that we have violated our conscience and done wrong things. Any person you talk to all over the earth, they don’t know anything about Jesus, but they have a sense of sinfulness. It says in Romans 1:21, “Although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him.” A few verses later, in Romans 1:25, it says, “They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served created things rather than the creator – who is forever praised. Amen.”

So I think this is the everlasting covenant that the people have broken. Just by their wickedness, by their violation of their consciences, they have sinned. This violation of God’s internally written moral code is universal, friends. It’s universal. Thus, we can say of both Jew and Gentile alike, there is no one righteous, not even one. There is no one who understands. There is no one who seeks God. All have turned away. They have together become worthless. There is no one who does good, not even one. So that’s what I think is the reason for the judgment of God coming on all the earth, because of our sinfulness, because we have violated it. This is the everlasting covenant. It produces defilement. As a result of that, the judgment comes.

You may wonder, what did the earth do? Why does the earth get beat up? Why does the creation get pounded? Friends, in God’s sight, the earth and its inhabitants are linked together. When Adam fell, the earth itself was cursed. There’s a strong link made between the human race and this planet we live on. It says in Romans 8:20-21, “The creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.” But creation is groaning. Creation is cursed. And creation will be judged because of human sin.

Still, in all of this terrifying judgment, in all of this terrifying wrath, God still remembers mercy. Amen! How sweet is that? There is a remnant protected from the wrath of God. Look at verse 6. It says, “Therefore, earth’s inhabitants are burned up, and very few are left.” Oh, there’s an alternative. Earth’s inhabitants are burned up and NONE are left. How’s that? Very few are left. The Bible calls this the remnant. Notice that they are proportionally very few in number. Now, how they got to be there we’ll cover in a moment. Where they came from, how they got delivered, we’ll cover that in a moment. I just want you to notice at this point that they’re there.

Verses 7-12 cover the end of worldly joy. Because of the judgments on the earth, people stop throwing parties. It’s not time to party any more. Look at verses 7-12. “The new wine dries ups and the vine withers; all the merrymakers groan. The gaiety of the tambourines is stilled, the noise of the revelers has stopped, the joyful harp is silent. No longer do they drink wine with the song; the beer is bitter to its drinkers. The ruined city lies desolate; the entrance to every house is barred. In the streets they cry out for wine; all joy turns to gloom, all gaiety is banished from the earth. The city is left in ruins, its gate is battered to pieces.”

We talked about this a few weeks ago. People always seek escape in worldly pleasures. They’re seeking escape from their guilt and escape from the coming judgment. They’re seeking to numb themselves with that morphine that I mentioned a few weeks ago, so that they don’t know of the judgments that are coming on the earth. They seek to dull their senses with wine and with beer, with partying, with hobbies, and with pleasures. They seek to escape. But there’s going to come a time that the judgment will be so poignant, so clear, so in your face, that it won’t be the time any more for gaiety. Verse 11 says, “All gaiety is banished from the earth.”

People have such an instinct for doing this. We talked about this a few weeks ago in Chapter 22. God called on Israel to weep and wail and tear out their hair and put on sackcloth. Instead they had a party. They slaughtered sheep and cattle and drank and sang, just like in Daniel 5 with Belshazzar’s feast. Belshazzar threw a big party as the walls of Babylon were surrounded by the Medo-Persian army that was about to conquer them that very night. And they’re throwing a party. So it was in May of 1945 in Berlin, in Hitler’s bunker. They’re throwing a wild party when the Red Army is bearing down on them, about to destroy the whole city. This is what people do.

But there comes a point at which that’s over. The time for drinking is over. No one wants to rattle the tambourine today. Nobody’s wanting to drink anymore. It’s a time of terror, a time of judgment. God shuts it down. All joy turns to gloom and all gaiety is banished from the earth.

The time has come for the destruction of the City of Man. Verse 12 says, “The city is left in ruins, its gate is battered to pieces.” As I’ve said before, this happens again and again and again in history. I have already listed three of them. It happened to Jerusalem. The gate was battered down and people swept in. It happened to Babylon. They got under the gate. They opened it. They came in and killed people while they slept and burned the city. It happened to Berlin. All you have to do is look at the pictures. You see what happened in Berlin, what the Red Army did to Berlin. It’s happened again and again and again. I think Isaiah 24 covers it: it’s the judgments of God. They say, “Can we really say that? Are we really saying that when a city is destroyed and devastated, it’s the judgment of God on them?”

God’s wrath is on all the earth. His wrath is against all their armies. There are no righteous political nations, do you understand that? There are no righteous armies that take the field except God’s army. The best way to respond to this is to say, “Except for God’s grace in the gospel, that is me. That’s us. We deserve that.” Do you remember in Luke 13, when some people came and told Jesus about these Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their offerings? They said, “Boy, they must have been really bad sinners. They’re making an offering to God and Pilate slaughtered them. They must have been really wicked. God was saying, ‘So much for your offerings.’”

”Jesus answered, ‘Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish.’” (Lk 13:2-3) There are no accidental conquerings of cities on the face of the earth, guys. All of it is judgment from God. What we should do is what Jesus said to do in Luke 13: take a lesson from history, repent, and deal seriously with the God who is bringing the judgments. That’s the biblical answer.

All right. In the middle of this terrifying chapter, we have this sudden outbreak of praise. It’s a bit odd, actually. As you’re looking at the judgments and all gaiety is banished from the earth, right in the middle of it, we have this song of celebration. Look at verses 13-15. “So will it be on earth and among the nations, as when an olive tree is beaten, or as when gleanings are left after the grape harvest. They raise their voices, they shout for joy; from the west they acclaim the Lord’s majesty. Therefore in the east give glory to the Lord; exalt the name of the Lord, the God of Israel, in the islands of the sea. From the ends of the earth we hear singing: ‘Glory to the righteous one.’”

So we have this godly remnant preserved and protected in the midst of this history that I’m describing. They are preserved and protected by the sovereign grace of God. They’re like olives that are left when the tree is beaten out, just a few of them. Or like grapes that are left when the harvest is taken, and there’s some left in the field, just a very few.

That’s proportional, friends. There’s actually going to be a huge multitude, more than anyone could count, around the throne. Amen! Jesus will have a huge army of people praising Him from every tribe, language, people, and nation. I’m just saying proportionally very few. Does that make sense? As it says in verse 13, “So it will be on the earth and among the nations.” Throughout the world, this song of celebration is coming. All around the world there are going to be some people celebrating God in the midst of all this. Where do they come from? Well, I think Romans 11:5 tells us where they come from. It says in Romans 11:5, “So too, at the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace.” The sovereign grace of God goes ahead of His judgments and works in the lives of the elect, transforming them and rescuing them from His own wrath to come.

Like it said in Isaiah 3:10, “Tell the righteous it will be well with them.” Amen! “Tell the righteous it will be well with them.” My question is, where did the righteous come from?

The first reaction of the righteous is to celebrate, sing for joy, and praise the Lord for His grace, His mercy, His power, and His judgments, for they are perfect in all of their ways. But where did these righteous people come from? I thought we said that there is no one righteous, not even one. There is no one who understands. There is no one who seeks God. Where have these righteous seekers of God come from?

Friends, you know where they came from. They came from the gospel of Jesus Christ. As the gospel is preached to the ends of the earth, people repent of their sins. They turn away from wickedness. They get an imputed gift of righteousness and they are seen by God to be righteous. They’re given a new nature and they start to celebrate the God of Israel. They praise the God of Israel, as it says in this text. Why would they do that? Why would Gentiles, why would barbarians and Scythians praise the God of Israel? Why would they praise the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? Why would they be happy to call themselves adopted sons of Abraham? Because salvation comes from the Jews, dear friends.

God’s not a tribal deity, but He started with the Jews. To the Jew first, and then to the Gentile, comes the gospel. This is the cross. This is the fruit of the cross of Jesus Christ. God sent His son into the world, His only begotten son, who lived a sinless life in this world, and who died in our place, taking this kind of judgment on Himself and creating a city of refuge to which we can flee. Like Noah’s ark, we can get into this place of refuge. This judgment will pass us by and we will not be swept away by the wrath of God.

My question to you is this: does that include you? You came here today to hear a sermon. Maybe you’ve never been to this church before. You think, “They’re preaching through Isaiah 24. What an interesting church.” Here it is, Isaiah 24. In the middle of it, you hear the gospel of Jesus Christ. You have the cross, the cross of Christ right here, right now. Preach the cross. That’s the only way that from the east and from the west and from the distant islands there is this remnant that will praise the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Believe in the Lord Jesus and you’ll be forgiven. Trust in Him. Call on the name of the Lord, and you’ll be saved. All your sins will be forgiven. That’s what God sent His son into the world to do.

That’s the first reaction of the righteous: celebration, praising God for His judgments, praising God for His salvation. But there’s a second reaction too. Look at it in verse 16. This is Isaiah’s lamentation. “But I said, ‘I waste away. I waste away! Woe to me! The treacherous betray! With treachery, the treacherous betray!’” Clearly, Isaiah is very distraught, distressed about something. There are two possible explanations. One is that he has grieved over those that are perishing, that they’re going to end up in hell. That’s a biblical grief. Paul shows it in Romans 9, as he says, “I speak the truth in Christ. I’m not lying. My conscience confirms it in the Holy Spirit. I have great sorrow and I have unceasing anguish in my heart, for I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of these perishing among my people.”

So it’s possible, just as Jesus wept over Jerusalem. But I don’t think that’s what’s going on here. Instead, I think Isaiah is saying, “God, I wish you’d bring it sooner. Because in the meantime, the wicked people are doing really, really wicked things on the earth. They’re causing an awful lot of treachery and wickedness and suffering. Oh God, that you would slay the wicked and make it end!” It reminds me of the time that Elisha was dealing with Hazael, who was soon to become, though he knew it not, the King of the Arameans. Elisha’s telling him some things. At one point he just stares at him, and keeps staring and staring until the guy becomes ashamed. Then Elisha begins to weep, and Hazael says, “Why are you weeping?” He said, “I’m crying for all the damage you’re going to do to my people. That’s why I’m weeping. You’re going to slaughter the men. You’re going to rip open pregnant women. You’re going to kill children in the streets.”

Hazael has an odd reaction. He says, “How can I, a mere dog, do such great things?” What a sicko. I think that’s why Isaiah’s weeping here, saying an awful lot of wickedness still has to happen on earth. He’s looking forward to the purging of all of this wickedness.

Judgment is coming in verses 17-22, and it’s inescapable. God is bringing judgment on the earth. “Terror and pit and snare await you, O people of the earth. Whoever flees at the sound of terror will fall into a pit; whoever climbs out of the pit will be caught in a snare. The floodgates of the heavens are open, and the foundations of the earth shake. The earth is broken up, the earth is split asunder, the earth is thoroughly shaken. The earth reels like a drunkard, it sways like a hut in the wind; so heavy upon it is the guilt of its rebellion that it falls – never to rise again. In that day the Lord will punish the powers in the heavens above and the kings on the earth below. They will be herded together like prisoners bound in a dungeon; and they will be shut up in prison and punished after many days.”

Friends, they will run, but they cannot hide. They’ll try to hide, but they cannot escape. Do you see it? There’s something like a fine filter here. There’s terror. Then there’s a pit. Then there’s a snare. And if the terror doesn’t get you, the pit will get you. And if you’re able to climb out of the pit, then the snare will get you. There’s no escape. We’re dealing with the omniscient God of all the earth. You can’t escape Him, not that way.

Outside of Christ, there is nowhere to escape. Isaiah uses language of the flood. Verse 18 says, “The floodgates of the heavens are open.” Do you see that? “The foundations of the earth shake.” That happened as it did in the days of Noah. The foundation was shaken as it was in the days of Noah. “The earth is broken up, the earth is split asunder.” As it was in the days of Noah, so it will happen again. He’s not going to deluge the world with water. But the earth is going to reel like a drunkard, like a hut.

I get the picture of the medieval era. A bunch of highway robbers have been harried and chased. They’re running for their lives and they end up for refuge in some flimsy hut somewhere. The king’s soldiers have surrounded the hut and they’re all in there. It’s like, “Burn it and pull it down.” That’s the picture I get here. The earth is like a swaying hut, and God just pulls it down on top of the evildoers. It’s a picture of weakness. They tried to run, but they couldn’t. They can’t hide and they can’t escape.

The language, as I said at the beginning of the sermon, speaks of the end of the earth as we know it. We’ve seen this in Hebrews 1:10-12. It says, “In the beginning, O Lord, you laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like a garment. You will roll them up like a robe; like a garment they will be changed. But you remain the same, and your years will never end.” 2 Peter 3:10 says, “The day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare.”

One poet, I think his name was Elliot, said, “This is how the end comes, this is how the end comes, this is how the end comes, not with a bang, but with a whisper, with a groan.” No. No. That’s wrong. For eschatology, go the Bible okay? Not to a poet. For the future, let’s find out what the Bible says. It says, “It will disappear with a roar.” God’s judgment will not be quiet. “The earth and everything in it will be laid bare.” “In that day the Lord will punish the powers in the heavens above and the kings on the earth below.” What is that? The powers in the heavens above, they get punished, so I guess they’re wicked. Right? What are the wicked powers in the heavens above? They’re satanic. They’re demonic. It’s Satan and his kings up there, his rulers and authorities and powers of this dark world. It says in Ephesians 6:12 that our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against those satanic forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Yes, but here in Isaiah 24:21, they meet their end. He’s going to judge them. He’s going to herd them together and punish them.

The powers in the heavens above and the kings on the earth below, it says they’re going to be herded together and punished after many days. What is that talking about? I’m not entirely sure. But I think 2 Peter 2 takes a crack at it. The Lord knows how to judge people temporarily and hold them in punishment while waiting for a future punishment that’s yet to come. You read about it in 2 Peter 2. The Lord knows how to do that while rescuing the righteous at the same time. He knows how to do that. There were some demons back in the day who did specifically wicked things. The Lord herded them together and put them in Tartarus, in this pit. They’re held there for future judgment.

I think this is throughout history. The Lord has herded together these wicked ones and they are waiting for final punishment. Do you see what I’m saying? After many days, they will be punished. By the way, this is what the demoniac Gadarenes, Legion, were afraid was going to happen to them. They said, “Jesus, have you come here to torture us before the appointed time? Are we going to get herded up and thrown in the pit?” Jesus didn’t do it at that point. He let them go into the pigs.

Now look at the glorious finale, verse 23. All of this judgment, all of this wrath towards the powers in the heavens above, the kings on the earth below, the surface of the earth, but the final word here is glorious, isn’t it? Glorious. “The moon will be abashed, the sun ashamed; for the Lord Almighty will reign on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, and before its elders, gloriously.” God’s going to set up His city, the New Jerusalem. That’s Mount Zion. Mount Zion, I think, represents God and man together in perfect fellowship. That’s how it is, God reigning in the midst of His people. Jerusalem was a dress rehearsal of that, but the people weren’t pure. So God left, but Mount Zion and Jerusalem became one.

Revelation 21:1-4 says, “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.’” That’s what verse 23 is about. I think it’s so wonderful that the sun and moon get fired, don’t you?

Basically, they’re getting let go. They can’t do the job, not the way God can do it, and so their days are done. The sun is ashamed and the moon is abashed. They will not get to light the new heaven and the new earth. Who’s going to light the new heaven and new earth? We don’t need the sun for that. We don’t need the moon and don’t need the lamp, because the glory of God will give it light. The Lamb, Jesus, will be its light. We will be radiated at every moment with the glory of God. Then we (the elders represent us, the redeemed), we will shine like the sun in the kingdom of our Father.

So, applications. After my Kroger errand, what were my applications, as I watched the sun set on another day here in this present earthly age, and as I thought, “It’s all going to go away. It’s all going to go. It’s going. It’s temporary. This world is temporary.” The first application, I’ve already given you. Flee to Christ. There is no other ark for this coming flood. Flee to Jesus. Don’t think to yourself, it’s not coming just because you don’t see any evidence that it’s coming. It’s coming. God’s word says it’s coming. So flee to Christ. As it says in 1 Thessalonians 1, He rescues us from the coming wrath. It’s interesting. He also brings the coming wrath. He is the only rescue from the wrath He’s coming to bring. Flee to Jesus.

Secondly, look at everything differently. Please immerse your minds in this: this is all temporary. Don’t live for this stuff. Don’t live for the money. Don’t live for the accolades. Don’t live for ambitions. It’s all temporary. Look at it differently. The vast forests are temporary. The seemingly unshakeable mountains are temporary. They’re going to go into the depths of the sea. The sea itself is temporary. Look at things differently.

Thirdly, I don’t think we can do any better on application of this very point than 2 Peter 3. He says very plainly that since everything will be destroyed like this, what kind of people ought you to be? All right, that’s application of this very point: how should we live? Well, you ought to live holy and godly lives. Hate sin. Be pure. Be holy. Purify yourself just as He is pure. 1 John 3 says to purify yourself from the evils that is bringing this judgment on the earth. Purify yourself from sin. Fight the battle of sanctification.

Look forward to the day of God. Look ahead. Say, “I’m yearning for the day when God will dwell amongst us gloriously. I’m yearning for that.” Speed it’s coming. Speed the coming of the Day of the Lord. How do you do that? By evangelism, by missions, by taking the gospel to the ends of the earth. The distant islands are going to sing praise for the God of Israel. Tell them. Be involved in missions. This church needs to be involved in missions. We need to be a mission launching pad. You guys need to care about unreached people groups. You need to care about missionaries that are on the field. We need to pray for them. You need to be one as God calls you, or to support them vigorously with everything you have.

Do missions here at home. Be willing to be weird this week. Say, “Did you know that the world’s going to end?” “Oh really? Soon?” “Yes, soon. Jesus said, ‘I’m coming soon.’” “How soon?” “Don’t know. But it’s coming. Are you ready?” So go ahead and be weird this week. Tell your fellow classmates or coworkers or neighbors or relatives, “This world is going to end. Are you ready? Are you ready? Flee the wrath to come.”

Close with me in prayer. Father, we thank You for this complex, detailed, full chapter. There’s a lot here, and I pray that we’d be able to take in all of its themes. But the central message is clear. This world is temporary. This world is going to end in judgment and wrath from God because of our sins. Lord, thank You for the deliverance that Jesus has worked through the cross. Help us to flee, evermore flee to that cross, cling to it, and know that our salvation is secure and complete in Him through justification, but incomplete through sanctification. We must purify ourselves for the day that’s coming. God help us to be faithful in evangelism, to urge our friends and neighbors to flee the wrath to come. So in Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.

Pastor Andy Davis preaches a verse-by-verse expository sermon on Isaiah 23:1-18. The main subject of the sermon is God's promise to strip the prideful of their glory as a consequence of their sin.

I’d like to ask if you would turn in your Bibles to Isaiah Chapter 23. This morning we’re going to be looking at this oracle in Isaiah 23. While you’re at it, I wouldn’t mind if you would also flip over to Ezekiel 27. We’re going to be looking at things from Ezekiel 26, 27, and 28 as well for more details about Tyre. Take the time to go there. But our home base this morning is Isaiah Chapter 23.

 When our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ was beginning His public ministry, the Lord led Him to be baptized by John. Immediately after that, He was led by the Spirit into the desert where He was tempted by the Devil for forty days. In one of those temptations, the devil took Him to a very high mountain and showed Him in an instant all of the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. I don’t know how he did that. But in some way, he made all of the glory of the world flash by Jesus’ eyes, immediately and quickly, on that high mountain. A vision of the world, of its kingdoms, of the glories of those kingdoms, in an instant. Then he said, “All of this has been given to me. I can give it to anyone I want to. It will all be yours, if you will just bow down and worship me.”

You know very well that the Lord did not do that. He said, “Away from me, Satan, for it is written, ‘Worship the Lord your God and serve Him only.’” But I was thinking about that passage this morning, and how it is that the devil had the kind of power to be able to cause all of the glory of various kingdoms of the world to flash before Jesus’ eyes in an instant. I was thinking that the Word of God, frankly, has a similar power. Maybe not in an instant, but we can be transported geographically. We can move from wherever we are to a distant location. We can actually move across time as well. We can be put in distant places and distant times by the Spirit of God through the Word of God. We can learn the lessons of history. We can learn spiritual lessons from what God has done in history. That’s what’s going to happen today. By the power of the word of God, by the power of the Spirit, we’re going to be transported from First Baptist Durham. We’re going to sit by a harbor in the harbor city of Tyre. We’re going to learn the lesson. Maybe we’re going to look over it as it burns, as it smolders, as it’s being conquered by army after army. We’re going to seek to learn the spiritual lessons that God has for us to learn concerning the fall of Tyre.

We’re in this section of Isaiah in which he’s dealing with oracles against the nations. So you see here in 23:1, an oracle, sometimes translated as a burden, concerning Tyre. This is the tenth of ten such burdens, one after the other, from Isaiah 13 up through 23. We’ve had one oracle, or burden, against one nation after another. This is the tenth and final one, a specific burden, or oracle, against a nation or city on earth. The first of these was in Isaiah 13, an oracle or burden against Babylon. Then we went through a series of them, one after the other, whether Edom or Moab or Philistia or Damascus, Arabia; one after the other. Now, at last, we’ve come to the final one, the tenth, and it’s this oracle against Tyre.

It’s fascinating, as you consider the bookends of these oracles: the oracle against Babylon and the oracle against Tyre. There are two different kinds of power being dealt with in those two cities. With Isaiah 13, the oracle against Babylon, you have military conquests. You have the power to build an empire by military means. The power of Babylon is the power to conquer, to rise up and build a military machine that can steamroll one nation after another and build a mighty empire. It’s pictured in Daniel Chapter 7 as a series of beasts or animals, beasts that come up out of the sea, one after the other. All of them have the power to crush and devour their enemies and their neighbors. That’s the power of Babylon.

Isaiah 23 deals with the power of Tyre. It’s a very different kind of power. It’s economic power. The merchants of Tyre are not trying to dominate their neighbors. They’re trying to befriend them. They’re trying to shake their hands and smile at them, not because they care about them, no, but because they want to get their money. You can picture a used car salesman here. Nothing against used car salesmen, you can get into trouble with these illustrations. I’m not saying anything about that, but you picture a guy who’s trying to build a relationship. He’s trying to do it to gain worldly influence for the sake of money. So the Lord speaks these oracles against Babylon, against Tyre, and amazingly, the same word is spoken against each, and for the same reason. The Lord is going to lay these lofty cities low and He’s going to do it to humble the pride of all human glory. Whether a military glory, a military empire, or an economic one, all lofty towers and every high, stately trading ship, everything, every high lofty mountain will be leveled and made low. The Lord alone will be exalted in that day. All the idols will totally vanish. He is sweeping away idols here.

Tyre is described in Isaiah 23 as a wealthy merchant city. Look at verse 3. It says, concerning Tyre, that she became the marketplace of nations. Think of a Super Walmart, only bigger. Okay? A place where you can buy the stuff of this world. In verse 8, it says that Tyre’s merchants are princes whose traders are renowned or esteemed to the distant places of the earth. As a matter of fact, in verse 7, it speaks of far off lands. Look at verse 7. It says these people’s feet have taken her to settle in far off lands. Tyre was a city on the eastern Mediterranean coastline that was established for trade. It was established twenty-eight centuries before Christ by the Phoenicians. It had a seafaring people. The city itself was made up of two cities: a land-based city and then, just offshore, a pair of islands in the harbor of Tyre. These people were merchants. They sent out colonies for the sake of trade all over the eastern Mediterranean and eventually throughout the Mediterranean. For example, Carthage was a colony of Tyre. They were planted centuries before Rome came to ascendancy, and then they gave Rome a lot of trouble. Carthage eventually had military aspirations. You’ve heard the story of Hannibal and his elephants and how close they came to conquering Rome. Well, they were a colony of Tyre originally. Some scholars believe Tarshish, which is as distant from Tyre as you can be in the Mediterranean, in the western part of the Mediterranean in Spain, was also a colony.

Tyre is described as a fortress. It was very, very difficult to conquer, both the land-based city and the harbor-based city. You can picture Alcatraz, for example, an island, a rocky island, just offshore. Both of them had high, lofty protected walls. So the word “fortress” is used here. If you look at verse 11, it concerns the fortress, and the decree is that her fortresses, plural, be destroyed. Again, in verse 14, your fortresses are destroyed. So it’s a very powerful place, very, very difficult to conquer. It’s difficult to conquer because one of the things you do with a walled citadel is you surround it and starve it to death. Well, that just can’t happen with this merchant city. They’re very good on the water, and they can be constantly resupplied by their colonies. So you can’t starve them to death. There’s no chance. You can’t actually even get to the island fortress. If you don’t have a navy, you have no chance of subduing it, none. So it’s very, very difficult to conquer. This is Tyre, wealthy merchant city.

We know through the Bible of the good relationship that both David and Solomon had with Hiram, King of Tyre. Hiram sent cedars of Lebanon down (not for free, by the way) and sold them to David in exchange for some wheat. This is what they did. His son, Solomon, was able to build his palace and also the temple of God from trade with Tyre. This is the power of this incredible city. Put your finger here in Isaiah 23, turn over to Ezekiel 27, and you have a sense of the widespread trade of Tyre. Look at Ezekiel 27:12-23. It says, “Tarshish did business with you because of your great wealth of goods; they exchanged silver, iron, tin and lead for your merchandise. Greece, Tubal, and Meshech traded with you; they exchanged slaves and articles of bronze for your wares. Men of Beth Togarmah exchanged work horses, war horses and mules for your merchandise. The men of Rhodes traded with you, and many coastlands were your customers; they paid you with ivory tusks and ebony. Aram did business with you because of your many products; they exchanged turquoise, purple fabric, embroidered work, fine linen, coral and rubies for your merchandise. Judah and Israel traded with you; they exchanged wheat from Minnith and confections, honey, oil and balm for your wares. Damascus, because of your many products and great wealth of goods, did business with you in wine from Helbon, and wool from Zahar. Danites and Greeks from Uzal bought your merchandise; they exchanged wrought iron, cassia and calamus for your wares. Dedan traded in saddle blankets with you. Arabia and all the princes of Kedar were your customers; they did business with you in lambs, rams and goats. The merchants of Sheba and Raamah traded with you; for your merchandise they exchanged the finest of all kinds of spices and precious stones, and gold.” You get a picture of the vast wealth of Tyre and the widespread nature of their trade, their colonies. The oracle begins in verse 1 with ships of Tarshish from Spain, as far away from the eastern Mediterranean cities of Tyre and Sidon as you could be. They’re making their way. They’re sailing across the Mediterranean. Their bows are pushing the water aside, the wake is trailing behind them, and they haven’t heard yet. They haven’t heard the news. It’s not until they get to Cyprus, which is a big island in the eastern Mediterranean, that they finally hear: Tyre is destroyed. There’s nowhere for you to bring your cargo. You have to go to a different place. Tyre has been destroyed.

It’s actually very dramatic. It’s how, if you are a producer making a movie of this chapter, you’d begin. Those ships of Tarshish sailing back to Tyre and they hadn’t heard the news yet. The news hasn’t come. So Tyre is described as a wealthy merchant city.

Secondly, we learn from Ezekiel rather than in Isaiah 23, that Tyre is exposed as a satanic stronghold. Really what we get here (and this is why I began this sermon as I did with Jesus and Satan), is that behind Tyre’s economic might and power, there is a malevolent force, a dark demonic force. Satan is there. Again, you’re not going to get this from Isaiah 23, but you’re going to get it from Ezekiel 28. So go over to Ezekiel 28. There you’re going to see an amazing thing. Ezekiel 26 and 27 describe Tyre as an actual city, a real place up in the north of Israel, a coastline city that carried on trade. There are various words of woe and lamentation spoken concerning Tyre and Sidon.

But in Chapter 28, we have this prophecy directed against the King of Tyre. The language of this prophecy reaches a spiritual level that’s very difficult to align with just a human king. It begins in verse 12. Ezekiel 28:12-19 says, “Son of man, take up a lament concerning the King of Tyre and say to him: ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: ‘you were the model of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone adorned you: ruby, topaz and emerald, chrysolite, onyx and jasper, sapphire, turquoise and beryl. Your settings and mountings were made of gold; on the day you were created they were prepared. You were anointed as a guardian cherub, for so I ordained you. You were on the holy mountain of God; you walked among the fiery stones. You were blameless in all your ways from the day you were created til wickedness was found in you. Through your widespread trade you were filled with violence, and you sinned. So I drove you in disgrace from the mount of God, and I expelled you, O guardian cherub, from among the fiery stones. Your heart became proud on account of your beauty, and you corrupted your wisdom because of your splendor. So I threw you to the earth; I made a spectacle of you before kings. By your many sins and dishonest trade you have desecrated your sanctuaries. So I made a fire come out from you, and it consumed you, and I reduced you to ashes on the ground in the sight of all who were watching. All the nations who knew you are appalled at you; you have come to a terrible end and will be no more.”

Friends, how could this be talking merely about an earthly king? He was in the garden of God. He was in Eden. He was on the mountain of God. He was exalted. He was perfect in beauty. He was in some way holy and pure on the day he was created, until wickedness was found in him. Many scholars believe that this is speaking of the fall of Satan. As a matter of fact, probably the greatest single unanswerable question in theology is how it was that wickedness was found in Satan to begin with. Where did it come from? There is no answer. It just happened. In some way, God gave him the freedom to become wicked, though the wickedness did not come from God. He was cast down. He was expelled from the mountain of God, thrown down to the earth. I mean, you’re reading through these verses and you know you’re not talking about a human king any more. Amazingly, the same kind of thing happens in Isaiah 14. Right after the oracle against Babylon, the prophet turns his guns on the King of Babylon and uses the same type of language. He said, “I will ascend to the mountain of God. I’ll make myself like the most high.” All this lofty language, but he will be thrown down. Same message.

They have the same king, friends. Babylon and Tyre have the same king. He loves to hide himself behind human puppets, behind the human kings that he is the puppet master of and to orchestrate their comings and goings and their dealings, whether their military conquests or their widespread trade. In their love for the things of the world, behind all of it is Satan. He’s unmasked by the Word of God. It makes perfect sense because he doesn’t reveal himself openly as who he is. He doesn’t come to Eve in the garden and say, “I’m Satan. I’m here to destroy your world.” He comes disguised. He comes clever. He’s not what he appears to be. He disguises himself as an angel of light. He’s attractive; he’s alluring. That’s the danger for us. Would we do as well as Jesus if we were shown all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor? Well, Satan’s not offering that to peons like you and me. He’s just offering us a small portion of it. Just a little bit of the glory of the world, just a little taste, and that will probably be enough for many of us. He needs to be unmasked, dear brothers and sisters. We need to see behind Tyre and see what’s going on. Because in our text, Tyre’s destroyed, but the spirit of Tyre lives on. It’s going to continue right to the end.

In Revelation 18, this vast trade city of Babylon gets thrown down in the ocean, and we have the same kind of perspective. The distant people who can’t trade with it any more are standing far off and wailing and lamenting over its fall. It’s the same type of thing. The spirit of Tyre lives on because it’s what Satan is doing. He must be unmasked. We must see him for what he is. We must understand that he is standing there offering us the world. He’s offering you the world if you’ll only trade your soul for it. And it’s Jesus alone who speaks wisdom to us, saying, “What would it benefit you if you would gain the whole world and lose your soul?” What would you give, what portion of the world would you give, in exchange for your soul? Or reversing it, what portion would you hold on to, saying, “That’s too expensive. I’ll go ahead and lose my soul?” Jesus is speaking wisdom across how Satan is lying to us about Babylon and Tyre.

We have to see him unmasked, so that’s Tyre exposed as a satanic stronghold, truly. Go back to Isaiah 23. We have the oracle now, and we face it full on. The oracle is against Tyre and its satanic overlords. Tyre will be destroyed. By the way, it’s interesting, the King of Tyre, his future is to burn. If you look at that, fire is going to come out and consume him. You read about it in Revelation 20, when at last the devil is thrown into the lake of fire where he will burn forever and ever. As we know from the story of the sheep and the goats, Jesus says, “Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.” That’s the King of Tyre. That’s where he’s going. A fire will consume him forever.

So judgment is decreed against Tyre, and we have this oracle of judgment. Look at Isaiah 23:1 again. “Wail, O ships of Tarshish! For Tyre is destroyed.” It’s an oracle of destruction. You have it again in verse 11, where he has given an order concerning Phoenicia, that her fortresses be destroyed. It’s an oracle of destruction. Again in verse 14, it says, “Wail, you ships of Tarshish; your fortress is destroyed!” So the question comes: who planned this against Tyre and why? They’re friendly people. They’re easy to like. They’re very likeable veterans. When they come to your town, you’re going to like them immediately. They’ll slap your back. They’ll shake your hand. They’ll give you a hug. They’ll sell you what they have to sell. Why destroy them? What’s wrong? And who would plan such a destruction and for what reason?

On one level, we could say that who planned it are the military conquerors that are coming one after the other. The Assyrian kings planned it. Nebuchadnezzar planned it. Alexander the Great planned it. Well, they had their own plans. But God is the one that really planned it. And God is going to bring these nations, one after the other. It’s clear in Ezekiel 26 (you don’t have to go there), where he likens it to wave upon wave. The Lord is going to bring nations, plural, against you, O Tyre. You get the feeling of crashing waves, like tidal waves, just smashing Tyre one after the other, not all at once.

In 701 BC, it’s the Assyrians. They come and they conquer the land-based city. I told you that the island fortress is very, very difficult to conquer. They couldn’t do it. Then Nebuchadnezzar came over a century later. He did the same thing. He leveled the land-based city but could not conquer the island city. As a matter of fact, God, through His prophet, actually said, “You know, Nebuchadnezzar and Babylonian army, you guys worked really hard and you didn’t get much. So I tell you what, I’m going to give you Egypt.” That’s about the spirit of the oracle there. Every head was rubbed bare, every shoulder was rubbed bare, and what did you get? You got nothing. It slipped away in the night by ships of Tyre and you got nothing for it. You got no pay. You’re doing my will, so I tell you what, I’m going to give you the grain of Egypt, of the Nile.

Then along comes Alexander the Great. They don’t call him Alexander the Great for nothing. He’s a man of great ego, a man of great ability, a man of great ambition. He says, “All right, I know that the land-based cities have been conquered before. I know I can do that. I want that island city.” And he tried and he tried and he tried. He built the causeway out to the island using the rubble from the destroyed city on land. He strapped it into the harbor and started to build up a causeway. This is an ambitious man, he’s not to be deterred.

The problem is you’re approaching a walled fortress, a citadel. They’re shooting at you with arrows. They’re able to come out at night and destroy the work you’ve done. The ships are able to come and fire at you and you can’t really do much to them. Alexander finally realized, “I’m not doing this without a navy. I’ve got to have a navy.” So what does he do? He recruits the area ships to be his navy, and he conquers the city, levels it. At last the prophesies in Ezekiel come true. “I’ll scrape it bare like a rock and there fishermen will dry their nets. It’ll be a small village.” There’s a picture of it on the cover of your bulletin. There’s nothing there. Imagine a vast economic trading center like New York City, if the Lord tarries, one hundred years from now being a small fishing village. That’s about how shocking it was what happened to Tyre.

So Tyre would be destroyed. It says clearly in Isaiah 23:8-9, “Who planned this against Tyre, the bestower of crowns, whose merchants are princes, whose traders are renowned in the earth? The Lord Almighty planned it, to bring low the pride of all glory and to humble all who are renowned on the earth.” God did this. Yes, he used Sennacherib. Yes, he used Nebuchadnezzar. Yes, he used Alexander the Great. But they’re all dead.

No, this was God’s plan and His reason is plain. He wants to humble all mankind. He wants to lay the lofty city down low. He wants to crush human pride because at the root of all of this is idolatry. It’s worshipping and serving the created thing rather than the creator who should be forever praised, amen. God will not have it.

Our God is a jealous God and He will not have your heart going affectionately after the things of this world. So He crushes Tyre, even though they’re really nice guys who seek to be your friends, but not for free. He wants to crush it because He’s bringing low the pride of all glory. He’s humbling all idols. Tyre is destroyed as a divine punishment and as a warning to nations like us who come later, who have our own marketplace, our own economic ambitions, our own widespread trade, our own interests in the mighty dollar. It’s warning us to not be drawn into the marketplace of the nations and not to live for the almighty dollar, not to live for the merchandise. It’s listed there in Ezekiel 27 and Revelation 18, all of the stuff that you can get at Walmart or even Super Walmart. God destroys Tyre to warn us to not live for those things, to warn us against it and to humble us.

The glory of this chapter is that it doesn’t ultimately end with woe and disgrace for Tyre. Jesus will have His remnant from every nation. He will have His converts. The prophecy is very clear, if you look at verses 15-18. At the end of seventy years, the span of a king’s lifetime, the time of the exile to Babylon, Tyre’s going to be rebuilt. Tyre will again ply her trade with the nations and act like what she is, a prostitute who walks through a city, strums on her harp, and sings a song, an alluring song to try to get customers to come and trade with her and buy her wares. So she’s going to regain her place as a prostitute of the nations. She’s going to regain her trade among the nations. But ultimately, as Ezekiel makes plain, one nation after another will come and finish the job.

And yet, it says in verse 18, her profit and her earnings will be set apart for the Lord. They will not be stored up or hardened. Her profits will go to those who live before the Lord for abundant food and fine clothes. Friends, this is the best reason why you should not marry the world now. You’re going to get it after the resurrection anyway and it’s going to be far more beautiful then. It’s going to be resurrected itself. It’s going to be glorious. The meek will inherit what? What are they going to get? The earth. After all of the corruption’s over, after the decay is ended, after the resurrection, the meek will inherit the earth, the resurrected new earth and the new heaven. That’s why it says in Romans 4:13, “It was not through law that Abraham and his offspring received the promise that he would be heir of the world.” If you’re a child of God, if you are a son or daughter of Abraham, your title is “heir of the world.” What do you need it for now anyway? Now, God may give you some of it now to advance His kingdom, and so you can wear clothes and eat and have what you need. The money will come to you so that you can use it for His kingdom.

Jesus will have His trophies. He will have His victories, even in Tyre. Remember what He said in Matthew 11:21. He was talking about Korazin and Bethsaida where all of His miracles had been done, “Woe to you, Korazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! If the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.” They were ready to hear the gospel. As a matter of fact, some of them did hear the gospel from Jesus. In Luke Chapter 6, He was preaching in a wide plain area and many people came from that region of Israel and Judea and also from Tyre and Sidon had come and listened to Him preach, and brought their sick so that He could heal them.

Even more remarkable is in Matthew 15, where Jesus is walking through the streets of Tyre, and a Syro-Phoenician woman, a woman of Greek descent born in Phoenicia, came up. She’s a woman whose daughter was suffering terribly with demon possession. She’s crying out after Jesus. Jesus ignores her, doesn’t answer a word. The disciples aren’t really her advocates at that point. They say to Jesus, “Send her away. We’re sick of listening to her.” She’s really the picture of the persistent widow at this point. She will not be sent away. I get the picture that she comes and stands right in front of Jesus. Do you get that picture? “I’m not going home. You must deal with me.” Remember what Jesus said to her? “It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” It’s one of the toughest things Jesus ever said to anybody.

But He knew her. He knew her heart. In effect, you don’t come into the kingdom without getting humbled. At that moment, if she had gotten a little prideful, raised her chin a bit and said, “I’m no dog,” and walked away, what would she have gotten from Jesus? Nothing. But what does she say? She said, “Yes, Lord. But even the dogs get the crumbs that fall from their master’s table. Isn’t there something that can fall off for me?” And Jesus said, “Woman, you have great faith. Go home. You will find your daughter healed.” Isn’t that marvelous? What a sweet story. Jesus will have His remnant, if they’ll just come to Him humble and by faith and trust in Him. He will do a better healing than that. He’ll heal them of sin. He’ll heal them of death. He’ll give them resurrection bodies. They’ll live forever in that world I just described to you, that resurrected world, that new heaven and new earth. Live forever, you descendant of Tyre. You inhabitant of Tyre and Sidon, that’s where you live. You live in Super Walmartville. You need to find yourself in this chapter and say, “I’m not going to get sucked down the drain of Tyre. I don’t want to live there. I want to separate myself from it. I want to be pure and holy from its defilements.”

The last time Tyre shows up in the Bible is in Acts 21, when Paul is en route to Jerusalem where he will be arrested and put on trial for the gospel. Just before he gets there, he stops in the vicinity of Tyre and Sidon. Some disciples from that area come to meet him. Isn’t that sweet? The disciples of Tyre. These are Christians. It’s just incredible. They’re begging Paul not to go to Jerusalem. They’re convinced he’s going to be arrested there, which he will be. But they see that Paul will not be deterred and so they accompany him out. They kneel down on the beach; they pray with him; and they hug him and tearfully say goodbye to him. That’s the last time you see Tyre in the Bible. Isn’t that incredible? God will have His remnant from every tribe and language and people and nation. In the end, Jesus gets what He wants.

So, application to us. What do you get out of this chapter? First of all, the easy thing to do is to say, “I get nothing. This is some weird oracle about some city that got destroyed centuries ago and it doesn’t have anything to do with me.” Well, look again, friend. Look again. We do live in Tyre. The spirit of Babylon, the spirit of Tyre, whatever you want to call it, it’s still here. Satan is still roaming the earth. He’s still laying traps for your feet. He’s still speaking to your soul, giving you a small portion of the world, not the whole thing like he did with Jesus. He’s luring you with a little part of it. He’s trying to win your heart. He’s trying to win your affections with things that money can buy.

We are among the wealthiest people that have ever lived on the face of the earth. We are held accountable for all our stuff. So for me, the application is the same as it always is. I need to run to Christ. I need to flee to Jesus. I need to know that the blood of Jesus, His blood shed on the cross, His resurrection from the dead, is the only hope I have to escape the future judgment that’s coming on whatever Tyre there is when Jesus returns. I need to flee the wrath to come. And I can by running to Jesus, because He has absorbed the wrath to come for me. I can find a refuge in Jesus if I just, by faith, cry out for Him to be my savior. Maybe you came here today just to hear this message right now. You can say, “What must I do to be saved? I know I’m materialistic. I know I’ve been living for money. I know I’m living for the worldly pleasures of this world. I know that it has a lure on my heart. I want to be free but how do I do it?” Come to Christ. Jesus has the power to free you, to save you from all of your idolatry, from the friendship of the world that is adultery toward God (as James 4 puts it). He has the power to deliver you from that. Come to Christ, look to Jesus. You don’t need to do anything. You just need to believe and trust.

For the rest of you who know that you’re forgiven, you know in your heart that Tyre has power over you. You know it, don’t you? You can feel the lure of it, the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, the boastful pride of life. It’s a magnetic pull on you and it’s hard to resist. It’d be good for you just to acknowledge it, to admit that you have sometimes slept with the prostitute, worldliness, that your heart has been lured away from sincere and pure devotion to Christ and that you went after worldly things. Confess it, as the text says. Wail over it. Be ashamed about it and turn away from it and hate it, as I talked to you about it last week. Genuine repentance.

Do not love the world and do not love the things of this world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. The battle against worldliness is one of the hardest and most challenging to define. What is worldliness? Do I have too much stuff? Am I making too much money? Do I buy too many things? Do I need to get rid of some things? These are hard questions, and the text makes us face them. Scripture makes us face them. I can’t answer for you. When the elders, the leaders of a church answer for you, that’s a cult, dear friends. You will have to answer for yourself. But the question stands in front of you. My job is to put the question in front of you. It’s your job to answer. Are you worldly? Have you bought too much stuff? Are you living too much for the things of this world? Does God want you to free up more of your resources for the advancement of the kingdom? For the relief of the poor and needy? That’s a question you have to face. The scripture will help you face it. Keep it in front of you for the rest of your lives.

So, I end with this. In I Corinthians 7:29-31, in the marriage section, Paul says something interesting. He says, “From now on those who have wives should live as if they had none.” Friends, don’t go too far with that, okay? Don’t misunderstand that. What he’s saying there is that those who use the things of this world should do so as if not engrossed in them. Being engrossed in the wares of Tyre is materialism, which is greed or covetousness, which is idolatry. It says it multiple times.

Say it, “Lord, search me and know me. Am I using the things of this world appropriately or am I engrossed by them? And if I am engrossed, oh God, I am your child. I know that. Deliver me from Tyre that I may not share its judgments.” Close with me in prayer.

Father, I thank You for this warning against Tyre. I thank You for what You did in history. Thank You for the fact that, by the Word of God, we can travel across the centuries back to when Alexander the Great scraped that city into the sea and made it a bare rock where fishermen dried their nets, so we can learn the spiritual lessons, not just study it as secular historians. We can learn the spiritual lesson that says there is a future judgment coming on Babylon and Tyre in Revelation 18. It will be thrown into the sea and heaven will celebrate at that point. Oh Lord, help us to understand that celebration, to embrace it, and to live not as worldlings but as true spiritually-minded sons and daughters of the living God. I pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Pastor Andy Davis preaches a verse-by-verse expository sermon on Isaiah 22:1-25. The main subject of the sermon is that we should respond appropriately when God reprimands us for sin.

This morning I am going to resume a sermon series in the Book of Isaiah, which I left about four years ago. Some of you were here at that time. We’re parachuting in, right in the middle of the book, to Chapter 22. As we come to Isaiah in general, as you heard a little bit in my prayer a moment ago, one of the challenges you have as you look at the Old Testament, as you look at Isaiah, is the question of relevance. How is this connecting to me, what’s happening in Isaiah and what’s happening in my life? Is there an unsurmountable gulf between the two?

The answer is, of course not. All scripture is God-breathed and useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so we may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. This chapter in particular has a powerful message to us. It’s important for us to hear. You heard, as Blake was reading, this rather familiar phrase: “Let us eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die.” So the issue in Isaiah 22 has to do with a sinful, wicked happiness, a wicked feasting that seeks to avoid the real spiritual issues that are going on. It seeks instead to get quickly to the party, to get quickly to a frivolous joy that doesn’t address the deeper spiritual issues. There’s nothing wrong, and I say there’s everything right, with the God-given desire to be happy. There’s nothing wrong with that. To be happy, to celebrate, to eat and drink and be merry, these things are wired into us.

Jesus did it a lot in His ministry, didn’t He? He seemed to go from one feast to the next, from one banquet to the next. Think about when Matthew turned from his sins and followed Jesus, leaving his tax-collecting booth. That evening he had a big party with all of his friends. They happened to be what were known as tax collectors and sinners. Jesus was there feasting with them. And the Pharisees and scribes were complaining about this, saying to His disciples, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” Jesus answered them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” (Luke 5:31-32)

He did it in the context of a banquet. But they spoke wrongly about him. Jesus says this, “The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’” (Mt 11:19) The first half is wrong. The second half (Amen), is true. Jesus is a friend of sinners. What a joy that is! There’s nothing wrong with desiring to feast.

Jesus actually told a parable in which He described an aspect of our heavenly experience as a wedding banquet, a banquet spread by a king. “The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son.” (Mt 22:2) And then a few verses later, he sends out messengers, saying, “’Tell those who have been invited that I have prepared my dinner: my oxen and fattened cattle have been butchered and everything is ready. Come to the wedding banquet.’ But they paid no attention and went off...” (Mt 22:4-5) The great sin of the people in that parable is that they didn’t come to the banquet. They didn’t come to the feast. They had other things they wanted to do.

So the desire to eat and drink and be merry, there’s nothing wrong with it. It’s perfectly fine if you seek it in the hands of God, by His holy means. Absolutely. But Jesus was also called a man of sorrows and familiar with suffering. The paradox, then, of the Christian faith is that it’s only by dealing properly with our sinfulness that we will be able to sit at the table with the perfect source of happiness, who is the Holy God. It’s only as we have our sins addressed and atoned for. Therefore, Jesus said, “Blessed [or happy, richly happy] are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” (Mt 5:4) The yearning for happiness is built into the human soul. Blaise Pascal put it this way, “All men seek happiness. This is without exception. Whatever different means they employ, they all tend to this end. The cause of some going to war, and of others avoiding it, is the same desire in both, attended with different views of what will make them happy. This is the motive of every action of every man, even of those who hang themselves.”

We seek happiness all the time. This sermon, this text, is not against happiness. It’s not against eating and drinking and being merry. That’s not it. Rather, the whole message of scripture points to a higher banquet, a higher feast, an eternal banquet, a heavenly banquet of joy in the presence of a holy God. Because this God is holy, we must have our sins atoned for. We must be atoned for. Our sins must be covered.

The scripture says that the atonement for sins is only worked by the blood of Jesus shed on the cross. God sent His Son into the world to atone for our sins, that His blood shed on the cross might be full atonement for our sins. But in order to access that atonement we must repent and believe the good news. Jesus said, in Mark 1:15, “The time is at hand. The kingdom of heaven is near. Repent and believe the good news!” Now, repentance always involves the true sight of sin as it really is. We see it by faith. We see at last, sin, as the grotesque, wicked thing it is. We see it in ourselves and genuine repentance always involves some sorrow for sin.

Jesus’ blood is, in some mysterious way, mingled with our tears to produce our own salvation. We have that woman, of course, who was a harlot, a prostitute, who comes in when Jesus is at one of those banquets. I think it was at the home of Simon the Leper. She’s weeping over Jesus’ feet and rinsing His feet with her tears, drying them with her hair. That’s a picture of her brokenness over her sin, her weeping those tears. Now, they’re not equal value, those substances. Jesus’ blood, our tears, both equally important, I’m not saying that. What I am saying is that when the Holy Spirit works genuine repentance and faith, then sorrow for sin is going to be part of your life. It’s part of the healthy Christian life. At the very beginning, sometimes you have such an overwhelming sense of your own wickedness. That’s why you’re running to Jesus. In the same way that woman just couldn’t stop crying. She’s bathing Jesus’ feet with her tears.

In Isaiah 22, we have pictured some people who want to feast and celebrate rather than weep and mourn over sin. They’re the ones that are saying, “Let us eat and drink for tomorrow we die.” I think the lesson that Isaiah the prophet gives us here in 21st century language is, “When God calls on you to mourn for sin, don’t party instead.” It’s not time for partying. It’s time for mourning. There is a time for that in Christian life.

Let’s look at these verses in an orderly way. First, in verses 1-8, we have revealed for us through the vision of Isaiah the prophet, that Jerusalem, the City of David, will be besieged. And it will be dealt with like any other wicked city. Now, the context here is that Isaiah is presenting a God who is sovereign over all nations. Later in Isaiah we will be told He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth and all its peoples before Him are like grasshoppers. The nations are like dust on the scales. They’re like a drop from the bucket. He is reigning on a heavenly throne over all of these things. Before Him, all the nations are as nothing. They’re regarded by Him as worthless and less than nothing. Later in Isaiah, in Chapter 34, it says, “The Lord is angry with all nations; his wrath is upon all their armies. He will totally destroy them, he will give them over to slaughter.”

In Isaiah chapters 13 through 35, we have one chapter after another after another presenting God as the master of all nations, the ruler of all nations. He’s king over all the earth. There’s one oracle after another against all of these Gentile nations. They just come one after the other: Assyria, Philistia, Moab, Damascus (the capital of Syria), Ethiopia, and Egypt. Chapter after chapter in Isaiah, we see oracles of judgment against Gentile nations. In Chapter 21, as a matter of fact, three nations get it. Babylon gets it, as well as Edom and Arabia. God’s wrath is against these three different Gentile nations.

Such a view of a single, all powerful God who rules over all the earth was in some ways, or at least to some people, new and foreign. They believed in national deities, the god of the Moabites, the god of the Assyrians, etcetera. They had national temples that would be set up. When one nation went to war against another, it would be their gods, god, or goddess against the other nation. They would see whose gods or goddesses were stronger. No, Isaiah has a whole different vision. It’s not like that at all. God rules over all the Earth, and He’s against sinners in every nation.

Such a view of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of the Jews, wrath-filled towards wicked pagans, bringing judgment on wicked pagan nations, would have brought delight to any patriotic Jewish heart. They would have looked at that and said, “Go get them, God! Go whip up on those wicked Gentile nations!” But we have a shock in Isaiah 22. Jerusalem is going to be destroyed like any other wicked city. God turns his oracle, through Isaiah, against the Jews of Jerusalem. In one sense, they’re no different than any Gentile. In another sense, they’re worse because they live in the Valley of Vision and they should have known better. They should have lived better. They had God’s word proclaimed to them in every generation. They should have lived at a higher level, and they didn’t.

So in one sense, it’s worse. Jerusalem is more accountable because of the prophets. Look at verse 1. It says, “An oracle concerning the Valley of Vision.” There’s a well-known book of Puritan prayers that takes its title from this chapter, “Valley of Vision.” “Valley” because Jerusalem is surrounded by three very significant valleys, and itself, in some sense, can be looked down upon from the Mount of Olives and some of the other immediately surrounding mountains. So it is a little bit lower.

That’s the valley part. Valley of Vision. “Vision” because Isaiah had one vision after another. He’s not the only one. The fact is that God has communicated with Jerusalem in every generation, generation after generation, through the prophets. He gives them visions. He gives them the word. The word of the Lord comes to this or that prophet, and they proclaim God’s will, God’s words to the people. Valley of Vision. But they have not responded. They have not received the word. They have rejected it so much so that Jesus, looking back over the whole history of the city of Jerusalem, weeping over it, says, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were unwilling. Behold, your house is left to you desolate.” (Mt 23:37-38) Or again, look at Stephen when he was about to be killed. As he’s getting to the end of his incredible sermon in Acts, Chapter 7, he says, “You stiff-necked people, with uncircumcised hearts and ears! You are just like your fathers, you always resist the Holy Spirit! Was there ever a prophet your fathers did not persecute?” (Acts 7:51-52)

Jerusalem is the Valley of Vision. God gave them the gift of visions, but they did not listen. They resisted the prophets in every generation. So Isaiah describes the siege. Look at verses 1-3. Speaking to Jerusalem, he says, “What troubles you now, that you have all gone up on the roofs, O town full of commotion, O city of tumult and revelry? Your slain were not killed by the sword, nor did they die in battle. All your leaders have fled together; they have been captured without using the bow. All you who were caught were taken prisoner together, having fled while the enemy was still far away.”

The city, Jerusalem, is filled with tumult and revelry, a city of laughter and lust, of eating and drinking and making merry, a city of bloodshed, wickedness, covetousness, greed, and sexual immorality. It was a party city in some ways, but now no longer. Now it’s a city of the dead. Isaiah mentions, “Your dead were not slain in battle.” They have dead people there, but why are they dead? Because of the siege. They’re dead because of starvation. They’re dead because of plague, disease. A city in which the leaders of outlying towns and cities have fled to the final citadel of Judah, Jerusalem, to save their lives. They didn’t fight out there. They had no courage, no strength to face the invader.

No, they run to Jerusalem for protection from Jerusalem’s walls. But there will be no protection there. The invaders have now come and surrounded Jerusalem and there will be no escape. This, in verse 5, is the Day of the Lord. It’s a theme that’s brought up again and again in the Old Testament, the Day of the Lord. The Lord Almighty has a day in store. Do you see it? It’s the Day of the Lord, it’s His day. “The Lord, the Lord Almighty, has a day of tumult and trampling and terror in the Valley of Vision, a day of battering down walls and crying out to the mountains.” (Is 22:5) This is a Day of Judgment, this day of wrath. There have been many of them in redemptive history. Again and again God brings a temporal judgment on a people. It’s a picture of the final Day of the Lord at the second coming of Christ, in which judgment will come finally in the end.

It says in Romans 2:5-6, “But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God’s wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed. God will give to each person according to what he has done.” So that’s the final Day of the Lord, what we call the day of judgment. But there are smaller Days of the Lord that happened along the way. Isaiah says, “This is a day of tumult and trampling and terror.” He says, “It’s a day of battering down walls.” Do you see that in the text? “Battering down walls and of crying out to the mountains,” looking for a place of refuge, calling or crying out to the hills, to the mountains. “Fall on us and cover us!” But there is no refuge.

So what is this? What is Isaiah talking about? This is the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians. This is not the invasion under the Assyrians. He covers that in other places in his prophecy. There, God said plainly to Sennacherib and to the Assyrian army, “You will not even approach the walls, and you certainly won’t build a siege ramp against it, and you will not batter them down. You’ll die before you even get there.” One hundred and eighty-five thousand Assyrians died in one night. Well, that’s not what this passage is talking about. No, because godly King Hezekiah, when he heard the reports of the Assyrians coming and when he saw what was happening, he humbled himself in sackcloth and ashes, cried out, and grieved over his sin, as did the city of Jerusalem. They pleaded with God to forgive them. They asked for mercy and God granted it to them. But in this chapter, there’s none of that going on.

No, at the time of Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonian invasion, the king was Zedekiah, a wicked man. All he sought was escape. He actually went out with some of his nobles, through the openings in the wall, and ran at night, trying to escape. What a coward. That’s somewhat included in this chapter. “Your leaders have all fled. They didn’t fight. They didn’t have the strength to take up bow and arrow or shield. They didn’t do that. They ran for their lives. That’s the kind of leaders you have, O Jerusalem.” Well, those are the days of Zedekiah, the days of Babylon. That’s what Isaiah’s talking about.

In verse 4, we have Isaiah’s overwhelming reaction to this prophecy. This is the prediction of the destruction of Jerusalem, the city of his own people. Look what he says in verse 4. “Therefore I said (this is Isaiah speaking) Turn away from me; let me weep bitterly. Do not try to console me over the destruction of my people.” Jeremiah is called the weeping prophet, but I think Isaiah did plenty of his own weeping too.

Isaiah is overcome with grief for the destruction of Jerusalem, overcome with grief over his own people. It’s a grievous thing when God’s own people break the covenant, the holy covenant. When, through their wickedness and sin, God brings final judgment on them. God himself is highly emotional about sin. He’s an emotional being. You get your emotions from Him. You’re created in His image. God has emotional reactions to our sins. We’re told in Ephesians 4:30, “Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” Grief is a serious sadness, a deep-rooted sadness that comes. Think about some of the tragedies that happen in life, even someone getting hit by a car and almost dying, or maybe a toddler that actually does get killed, and the grief that come over that. It’s frequently associated, I think, with death for the most part.

The Holy Spirit is grieved when we sin. It’s an emotional reaction. Later, God will say in this text that He called on the people to grieve too. “I’m grieving,” God is saying, “You should grieve too. We should be in unity on this, because of the sin.” Isaiah’s already doing it. He’s grieving over the destruction of his people and over the sins that brought it about. He’s weeping over it, saying, “I can’t be consoled.” What’s really amazing about this is that this is a prophecy one hundred and fifty years before this even happens. Think about that. This is about a century and a half before this stuff will even happen, and God gives Isaiah this vision. Maybe he’s writing it down on a scroll and puts down his pen, and starts to weep over it. He’s already doing it.

Now, he mentions Elam and Kir in verses 5-6. These are distant enemies, Gentile nations, who are going to come and do the job. “The Lord, the Lord Almighty, has a day of tumult and trampling and terror in the Valley of Vision, a day of battering down walls and crying out to the mountains. Elam takes up the quiver, with her charioteers and horse; Kir uncovers the shield.” Isaiah is a stunning and amazing prophecy. It’s just incredible to me. He moves back and forth from section to section across centuries of time, without even stopping. I think of an eagle that’s on the peak of one mountain and wants to go to the peak of another mountain. It flies there in about three minutes. Whereas if we try to climb, we’d have to descend one slope and go up another. It would take us all day, or maybe two.

But Isaiah, with the eagle eye of prophecy, can go from one century to the next and back again, no problem. Elam and Kir, they actually are the very people that God, in Chapter 21, is going to raise up to destroy the Babylonians. They are the Medes and Persians, ultimately. But before that ever happens He’s going to use them to destroy Jerusalem. They’re going to come with chariots and siege instruments and all that. They’re going to be victorious. They’re going to win.

Verse 7 says, “Your choicest valleys are full of chariots, and horsemen are posted at the city gates.” Verse 8, “The defenses of Judah are stripped away.” They are defenseless. The walls are broken down. They have nothing left. They’re going to be destroyed. The siege is devastating. All of Judah’s protection is gone. Judah is stripped and laid bare, ready for the plundering. That’s verses 1-8.

All right, now what should Jerusalem have done? None of this has happened yet, when Isaiah gives the word, when he gives the prophecy. He’s just predicting what’s going to happen. What should they have done? Well, they should have had faith toward God and repentance toward their sins. It’s a double vision. It’s two sides of the same coin. Toward God you look. You look toward God. It’s a look of faith. You’re going to look to God and trust in Him. You’re going to look towards your sins and grieve over them. It’s the same thing, really. That’s what they should have done.

The visions of the prophets had warned the people of Jerusalem that this was coming. They knew it was coming. I already told you that this is one hundred and fifty years before the fall of Jerusalem. Plenty of warning. The Valley of Vision, one hundred and fifty years ahead of time. Isaiah himself had said, “God is not pleased with the Jews. He’s not pleased with your religious system, your animal sacrifices.” “What are they to me?” says the Lord. “I don’t care about this river of blood, animal after animal that you’re sacrificing. I’m sick of it, frankly. I have more than enough of the blood of fattened rams and lambs and all that.” “Wash and make yourselves clean. Take your evil deeds out of my sight! Stop doing wrong, learn to do right! Seek justice, encourage the oppressed. Defend the cause of the fatherless, plead the case of the widow. ‘Come now, let us reason together,’ says the Lord Almighty. ‘Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall be like wool. If you are willing and obedient, you will eat the best from the land; but if you resist and rebel, you will be devoured by the sword. For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.’” Isaiah 1:16-20

I think that’s very clear. In Isaiah 5, he actually tells them a variety of their sins: their drunkenness, their social oppression, their taking of widows’ houses and adding house to house till no space is left in the land, and all of the wickedness. It’s very, very plain in Isaiah’s prophecy. They know exactly what God thinks about the way they’re living. So that was warning enough. Isaiah is enough.

Then as time goes on, Assyria invades. The Northern Kingdom, the ten tribes, they get destroyed and swept away into exile. That’s a pretty strong warning, don’t you think? It’s warning to Judah, “This could happen to you.”

It’s even clearer when these events actually start happening and you’re in the city of Jerusalem. Nebuchadnezzar starts conquering some of the little kingdoms north of you, one after the other after the other. Assyria falls to the Babylonians. Tyre falls to the Babylonians. Nebuchadnezzar is coming. And at that same time you have Jeremiah the prophet saying plainly what’s going to happen. He’s using exactly the same language as Isaiah did. You can read about it in Jeremiah 4:4-8. “Circumcise yourselves to the Lord; remove the foreskin of your hearts, O men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem; lest my wrath go forth like fire, and burn with none to quench it, because of the evil of your deeds. Declare in Judah, and proclaim in Jerusalem, and say, ‘Blow the trumpet through the land; cry aloud and say, ‘Assemble, and let us go into the fortified cities!’ Raise a standard toward Zion, flee for safety, stay not, for I bring disaster from the North, and great destruction. A lion has gone up from his thicket, a destroyer of nations has set out; he has gone out from his place to make your land a waste; your cities will be ruins without inhabitant.” Listen to this, this is Jeremiah 4:8. “For this put on sackcloth, (Do you hear that?) lament and wail, for the fierce anger of the Lord has not turned back from us.” It’s the same message, before it happens.

When, in our text, it says, “The Lord Almighty called you in that day,” that’s Jeremiah doing that. Do you see that? He’s going to send Jeremiah to go say, “Put on sackcloth and cry and wail.” God spoke to them. So what should they have done? First, they should have looked to the Lord. Verse 11 speaks of all the military preparations they make. More on that in a moment, but look at verse 11. “You built a reservoir between the two walls for the water of the Old Pool, but you did not look (Do you see the word “look?”) to the One who made it, or have regard for the One who planned it long ago.” What’s that “look?” It’s faith, friends. It has to do with what you trust. You looked to this, but you should have looked to God. Does that make sense? As Isaiah 45:22 says, “Look unto me, and be saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is no other.” The KJV keeps the “look.” All the others say, “Turn to me,” but KJV has “look.” So it’s a look of faith, right? Look to God. Trouble is coming. Look to God with the eyes of your heart, which is faith. By faith, see Him who is invisible.

Second, look to your sins and grieve over them. Look at verse 12. “The Lord, the Lord Almighty, called you on that day to weep and to wail, to tear out your hair and put on sackcloth.” This is an expression of great grief over sin. Grief! Grief! You look and you see your sins. They call you to cry out against yourself. I don’t know that it’s literally that you’re going to rip the hair out of your head, but there’s this sense of intensity. “God, how could I do this against you? How could I sin against such a God as you?”

There’s a crying out against yourself. You put on sackcloth because it’s rough, and you’re like, “I don’t want comfort. I don’t want earthly consolations now. I don’t want an earthly party. I have sinned against God.” That’s what it’s calling on you to do. Take your sins seriously. Grieve over it. That’s what they should have done. The New Testament version is in James 4:8-10. “Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn, and wail. Change your laughter to mourning, and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.” That’s what they should have done, looked to the Lord, looked to their sins, and grieved over them. What did they do? Well, they made faithless military preparations and they had a party. That’s what they did.

I mean, they got ready for the Babylonians to come. They shored up their defenses as best they could. They made preparations, first described in verse 8. “You looked in that day to the weapons in the Palace of the Forest.” That was their armory. So they went and counted their weapons. “All right, we have X number of swords, X number of shields. We have bows and arrows. All right, good. We’re ready.”

Look, there’s nothing wrong with making military preparations. The Old testament has a lot of examples of godly people who made military preparations. That’s not the issue. The issue is that they did that but did not look to the Lord. It’s a contrast. They were trusting in the weapons, trusting in the military. They were not trusting in God. You’ve heard the World War II saying, “Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition.” Well, this was just “pass the ammunition.” They skipped the Lord part. So they were trusting in the weapons. Verses 9-11 says, “You saw that the City of David had many breaches in its defenses, you stored up water (You’re going to need water) in the Lower Pool.” You need water for the siege. “You counted the buildings in Jerusalem and tore down houses to strengthen the wall.” You need some more building materials for the gaps in the walls, so you tore down the houses that weren’t needed. You took the rubble and the wood, and you shored up the defenses of the wall. “You built a reservoir between the two walls for the water of the Old Pool.” There’s nothing wrong with that. But they did not look to God while they were doing it.

Secondly, they had a fleshly celebration. They had a party. Look at Verse 13. “But behold, there is joy and revelry, slaughtering of cattle and killing of sheep, eating of meat and drinking of wine! ‘Let us eat and drink,’ you say, ‘for tomorrow we die.’” Having done their military preparations, they felt secure. It was time for a feast, time to have a party.

It’s a bit odd when you’re about to go through a siege. You really should be conserving food when people are going to be on rations for a while, don’t you think? But it’s an arrogance, a confidence, a hubris. “Hey, we can have a feast.” It’s what they did in Daniel 5, remember? Babylon, the night they fell, they had a big banquet, a big feast. They were confident. Or maybe the deeper issue was they were revealing that their god was their stomach. This is what they lived for anyway. This is why they were in the problem they were in. Their god was their stomach, all the time. It’s how they lived. “Might as well just do it again, because we don’t have much more time to have a good party.”

The apostle Paul quoted this exact verse in speaking of what life would be like if there were no resurrection. In 1 Corinthians 15, he said, “Suppose there were no resurrection from the dead. If there is no resurrection from the dead, then let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.” So like they say, you only live once. I guess it’s YOLO these days. I’ve heard that before. Very trendy. I think what’s connected with it is, “You only live once, so do stuff on your bucket list. Go out and have a good time. Do stuff you want to do before you die. Have a party, whatever. That’s the mentality I’m sensing from my culture. Do you get that? You only live once, so have a party.

Well, I think you only live once. That’s true. So live for the glory of God. Amen? You only live once, so go on a mission trip. You only live once, so share the gospel with your neighbor. I think that’s the right answer to “you only live once.” Don’t go have a party. But that same spirit is alive today. Do you see it, friends? Do you see it in yourself? I’m so glad that Eric read that parable of the tax collector and the Pharisee. It’s like, “Oh, I’m glad I’m not like those Jews back then. I’m glad I don’t have a problem with not repenting of my sin.” Friends, don’t fall into that trap. Jerusalem was spiritually bankrupt. They were completely hardened in their sin, unaware of God’s passionate hatred for their sin. So they went over and they celebrated and had a feast.

Now comes, in verse 14, God’s solemn response. Sometimes I have a hard time reading it without tears coming to my eyes. This is what God thought about that feast. He looks down and He sees this party going on. I mean, think about spiritual repulsion. It’s just disgusting to Him. And He said, “Isaiah, I want to tell you what I think about that feast.” “The Lord Almighty has revealed this in my hearing: (this is Isaiah speaking) ‘till your dying day this sin will not be atoned for,’ says the Lord, the Lord Almighty.”

Is this the unforgiveable sin? Throwing a party when God calls on you to wail for your sins? Well, in some sense, the answer must be yes. How is it unforgiveable? Well, here’s the thing. God gives a means of grace. He gives an avenue of grace, the working of the Holy Spirit. Blasphemy against the Spirit was called unforgiveable. God does these things to bring hearts to repentance. What is happening here? Repentance and faith in Christ are the way by which sins are forgiven. What these people are doing is openly scorning repentance. They are mocking repentance.

It reminds me of what HIV does to the body’s immune system. It goes after the helper T-cell and destroys it, so the body is defenseless against diseases. This sermon is going after that virus. This sermon is going after the thing that destroys the soul, so that godly repentance can stand and do its work. Does that make sense? I’m hunting it down right now, this spiritual virus that says, “Hey, mock repentance. Have a party if God’s calling on you to weep and wail.”

There is a kind of godly sorrow in 2 Corinthians 7. Frankly, if you want to know, James 4:8-10 and 2 Corinthians 7:10-11 are the parallel verses in the New Testament. 2 Corinthians 7:10-11 says, “Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret.” So there is a godly sorrow that I’m after today. I think the Spirit is after it in Isaiah 22. But worldly sorrow brings death. “See,” says Paul, “what this godly sorrow has produced in you; what earnestness, what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what alarm, what longing, what concern, what readiness to see justice done.” That’s what godly sorrow does. It brings about repentance and energy. Do you see? There’s a drive. It’s not emaciating and depressing. It causes you to say, “I have got to change. I want to bring about these changes in my life by God’s grace. I’m done with that sin.” That’s what it does. So when God calls for sorrow and mourning and repentance, and we feast and celebrate instead, there’s nothing left but judgment.

I’m not dealing equally with the rest of the verses as I’ve done with the first fourteen verses. Verses 15-25 are very interesting though. We go from this situation, the fall of Jerusalem, to this direct prophecy against an individual, Shebna the steward.

I just want to mention in passing, as I compare these two passages: what’s going on? Who is Shebna? Well, he’s a wicked man who is living for himself and his own glory. And God tells him in verses 15-16, “The Lord, the Lord Almighty, says: ‘Go, say to this steward, to Shebna, who is in charge of the palace: ‘What are you doing here and who gave you permission to cut out a grave for yourself here, hewing your grave on the height and chiseling your resting place in the rock?’”

He’s presumptuous and powerful, using his position of power to elevate and exalt himself and prepare for his death. He wants to have a mausoleum and be thought of as a wealthy, successful man. In verses 17-19, the Lord says, “The Lord is about to take firm hold of you and hurl you away, O you mighty man. He will roll you up tightly like a ball and throw you into a large country. There you will die and there your splendid chariots will remain – you disgrace to your master’s house!” Verse 19 says, “I will depose you from your office, and you will be ousted from your position.” So God’s going to take hold of this individual, this Shebna, and He’s going to throw him like a ball somewhere. He will not get to die where he hopes he’s going to die.

Now, the weird thing is, Shebna was a contemporary of Isaiah. He’s not going to die in the siege of Jerusalem. But what’s going on, and the juxtaposition is, “We’re moving from a nation, a whole nation, to a single individual. I know you by name. This is what you think. This is what I’m going to do with you.” Do you not see the relevance of that? Don’t just step back and say, “God is looking at the whole earth and we’re all like grasshoppers to him.” He knows Shebna. He knows exactly what he’s thinking and what he’s doing. He’s going to do something exactly directed toward him. So, what that means is that the text comes right at me. Does that make sense? Verses 1-14 come and talk to me. And they tell me not to make my own preparations for the grave. Don’t make my own lifestyle, my own religion. Go to the Lord and allow Him to prepare me for death. Don’t live for my own glory. Don’t use my position to elevate myself, as Shebna was doing.

He’s going to bring instead this Eliakim, a humble servant who’s going to take Shebna’s place. Look at verses 20-24. “In that day I will summon my servant, Eliakim son of Hilkiah. I will clothe him with your robe (Shebna) and fasten your sash around him and hand your authority over to him. He will be a father to those who live in Jerusalem and to the house of Judah.” Now listen to this, this is interesting. Verse 22: “I will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David; what he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open. I will drive him like a peg into a firm place; he will be a seat of honor for the house of his father. All the glory of his family will hang on him: its offspring and offshoots – all its lesser vessels, from the bowls to all the jars.”

Let’s cut to the chase. Eliakim was a real man who took Shebna’s place. He’s also a type, or picture, of Jesus Christ. It’s so strong that John the apostle, in writing the book of Revelation, picks up on these themes from Isaiah and he ascribes them to Jesus Christ. He says to the church at Philadelphia, in Revelation 3:7-8, “To the angel of the church in Philadelphia write: ‘These are the words of him who is holy and true (Jesus) who holds the key of David.” Here’s the key of David. Jesus holds it. The key is power. I can open and shut locked doors. The one who holds the key of David, “what he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open.” Then he speaks to the church at Philadelphia, “I know your deeds.” This is Jesus Christ.

He has sovereign power over the nations. He’s the one in charge. He is likened to a firm peg driven in and everything hangs on Him. Nothing will fall. Do you see? It’s a picture of Christ. Ultimately, the key speaks of Jesus’ total power over death. Revelation 1:18 says, “And I hold the keys of death and Hades.” So the second half of the chapter points to Jesus Christ. Yes, God speaks to every individual, like Shebna, and accuses us of sin through scripture. But then He immediately points toward Christ as a firm foundation for your life. The one who holds the key of death and Hades, that’s Christ, the one who died on the cross and rose again on the third day. The one you can hang your whole life on.

Some of you know that I built a tree house in my yard a couple of years ago. As I was doing the initial main boards that were going to hold up the whole tree house, I had to figure out what kind of hardware I was going to use to attach the 2x8 boards to the trees. So I chose 5/8 diameter steel lag screws that were six inches long. I looked it up and did the calculations, the last mechanical engineering I have done or perhaps will ever do. I found that they could hold 150,000 pounds each. Four of them, that’s 600,000 pounds. Friends, that thing’s not shearing down. It may come off another way, but I’ve had six, eight people in there. “Can it hold the weight?” I said, “Yes, it can hold the weight. It’s all right.”

It might not survive a hurricane. It might not survive the trees falling down. But it’s not going to shear down like it’s made of butter. It’s going to hold. All right? It’s definitely over-designed. But that’s it. That’s who I am. The fundamental thing is, these lag screws are a picture of Jesus. You can hang your life on Him and He won’t shear off out of the wall.

See what I’m saying? He’s the one that can face death on your behalf. He holds the keys of David, of death. And He can face it. Don’t be like Shebna, making your own provision, carving out your own grave, doing your own religion. That’s the second half of the chapter.

Now, application. Simply, clearly, run to Jesus. Flee to Jesus. Look to Him and trust in Him. He shed His blood on the cross for sinners like you and me. He rose from the dead. He now has the key of death and Hades in His hand. Trust in Him.

 Secondly, and briefly, I want to teach you, please mourn for your sins. Take the time to be holy. Can I just say that? Slow down. When the Holy Spirit convicts you of sin, stop. Pull aside. Go into your room. Close the door, when you have the chance, and go over it with the Lord. Don’t go too quickly to the party. Do you see what I’m saying? Don’t go too quickly, “God forgives me, everything is fine.” And then you never dealt with it. There’s a healthy way to deal with it and an unhealthy way to deal with it.

The healthy way is to take Jesus’ nail-scarred hand and walk down into the depths of your own wickedness with His blood. Understand that you’re forgiven the whole time, but see how much you need salvation still. That’s a healthy way. The unhealthy way is forgetting that Jesus died or thinking it’s insufficient or doesn’t count for you, getting depressed and stripped and emaciated spiritually. That’s the sorrow that leads to death.

In the 17th century, a Puritan pastor named Thomas Watson wrote a book called “The Doctrine of Repentance.” He said that true repentance has six elements. I’m going to list them. One of them is sorrow for sin. He said it’s sight of sin, sorrow for sin, confession of sin, shame for sin, hatred of sin, and turning from sin. Those are the six elements of genuine repentance, according to Thomas Watson. One of them is sorrow for sin. And I think we’re too much in a hurry, friends. We want to turn K-Love back on and be positive, uplifting, or positively uplifted.

Hey, look, I’m up for positive. I like uplifting. But I actually would rather be exalted than uplifted. Amen! God will exalt those who humble themselves. But I don’t think there’s anything wrong with uplifting one another. That’s good. And I’m not dinging on K-Love. Please, I’m not. But if all a church and a pulpit ever try to do is be positive and uplifting, that’s doing you no favors.

I was watching a wartime movie recently in which the corpsman, a medical officer, got hit with shrapnel. He’s laying and he’s bleeding to death. He’s trying to determine the level of his wounds. He’s basically doing an examination on himself with his buddies around him. He’s laying there, bleeding out, bleeding to death. Finally, after having felt his own wound, getting a sense of it, he knows he’s going to die. No doubt about it. So after a pause, he says, “I’d like a little morphine please.” And with that statement, everyone around him knew that he knew he was dying.

Well, the morphine is just for pain, right? To cover it over. That’s not why we’re here, friends, for a little morphine every week. We’re not here for a little morphine, we’re here for genuine healing. Amen! That healing is available through the blood of Jesus. Don’t short circuit. Don’t go quickly back to the party. Take time to be holy and grieve over sin. Close with me in prayer.

Father, we thank You for this time we’ve had in Your word, Isaiah 22. There’s more here than we can handle in ten sermons. Lord, I thank You for the message. Lord, You have called on us to weep and wail over sin, when needed. It’s not going to be needed every day. Some days we’ve been faithful. Our conscience is clear. We’ve served the Lord faithfully. There’s nothing to say. We just praise You. But sometimes, Lord, we know we’ve violated our conscience and Your laws and we have sinned against You. Help us to take You, O Lord, by the hand and go down into the dark pit of our own wickedness, not to morosely linger on the past, but to understand who we are and what our weaknesses are, so that we don’t sin again. O Lord, help us to do that. Thank You for Jesus. I pray, O Lord, for any that are lost here that they would find Jesus as their savior today. In His name I pray.