So we pray that your spirit of revelation and illumination would lead and guide us in Jesus' name we pray, amen. Okay, welcome back from Thanksgiving. I know we already had one Sunday but a lot of you guys were gone for Thanksgiving. Today we're looking at Isaiah chapter 5 and verse 6.
How many of you who have asked me for electronic copy didn't get one? Email me for electronic copy. If you didn't, email me because for whatever reason you have not been added, otherwise I've been emailing the electronic copies. Alright so let's, you should have gotten two pages, one is with the notes and the other one is for the next week's assignment.
So you should have gotten two of them. Alright so let's begin. So we're looking at chapter 5 and chapter 6. Chapter 5 continues God's case against Israel and again that's what we've been looking at starting from chapter 1. Chapter 1 all the way to what we're studying now. Chapter 1 kind of lays the foundation.
Chapter 2 begins an indictment. This is the reason why the judgment is coming. Chapter 5 is a continuation of that. In more detail, 1 through 4 details how God did everything like a farmer. So if you look at verses 1 through 4 it says, "Let me sing for you my beloved, my love song concerning his vineyard.
My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill." So I ask you to go look at verse 7. Basically he's saying that the vineyard of the Lord of Hosts is the house of Israel. So God's using the imagery of the farm and again to indict the nation of Israel.
So what he says is he did everything that a good farmer would do and would expect a good harvest. There wasn't anything lacking in the nation of Israel. So in other words, all the things that he's laid out, all the sins that they committed, all the compromises, that none of this is because God lacked something.
He gave them everything that they needed for them to bear fruit. He says first of all it was very fertile. He dug it and cleared it, he said first of all my beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. He goes down the list of what he did.
He cleared the stones. Now it doesn't say that clearing the stone means that he got rid of the enemies. These are just kind of my added notes on top of that. How did he cultivate the nation of Israel? He didn't just say hey go out and do your best.
He said that he planted them in the most fertile place. He cleared the stones. I kind of take that as all the enemies, all the obstacles that would prevent them from being successful, whatever it may be, he already came out and cleared it. That's exactly what God does, right?
When they come into the Canaanite land, they don't do the fighting. God does, it's kind of like God cleared a stone for him to plant the seeds. He plants choice vines. Again the nation of Israel were not just like any other nation. God gave them the law for them to follow and he said as long as you abide by my law, don't turn from it to the left or the right, you're going to bear fruit.
You're going to bear fruit, just don't turn from the left to the right. He built a watchtower. Watchtower basically after you plant something so that the animals won't come and take it. We take that again, he sent prophets and leaders just to watch over them. He hewed out wine vat and looked for it and expected it to bear fruit.
So again the image he's using is a good farmer who lays out every foundation that is necessary for it to bear fruit. He picks the most fertile ground, he clears out the stone, clears out all the enemies, he plants choice vines, gives them the law, he sends prophets to watch over them, the leaders to take care of them, and then he says he kind of waited, built the wine vat waiting for the fruit to come and basically in other words what he's saying is everything that they needed to bear fruit but didn't.
So no one can say that the reason why we didn't obey you is because it was too hard. The reason why we compromised is because we lacked this. He said no, the indictment that you are guilty of, you had everything, you had more than what other people can ask for.
This is kind of related to what we talked about on Sunday, Romans 3, it says what benefit is there being a Jew? It's like much in every way, how can you possibly even ask that? But above all the blessings that you have, on top of that you were given the laws of God, the word of God.
Turn your Bibles with me to 2 Peter 1, 3-5, and whoever gets there first, if you didn't just read it out loud. 2 Peter 1, 3-5. Whoever's there first, can you just read it out loud? "His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers in the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire." There?
No? Yeah, okay, up to there. So basically what he's saying in 2 Peter is the same thing that God is saying here. He's telling the nation of Israel that everything that you need you already have. And again, I think it's important for us to take a minute to kind of reflect on, you know, when we think about how we are, how much of our weakness and the reason why we wallow in our situation is because, you know, because of this.
And whatever "because" we use, in the presence of God he says, "No, I've given you everything that you need." So anytime we come before God and say, "I'm this way because," right? That's like the nation of Israel saying, "Well, of course we don't obey you because we don't have this.
We don't have the kings. We don't have the money, the circumstances, the religious, whatever." Right? So again, the reason why he's doing this is so that when the judgment comes, that there's not a single person that can stand under this judgment and say, "Hey, this is not fair." Right?
So what he's establishing here is the fairness of the judgment that's coming. So he's kind of breaking down every argument that an individual can stand and say or as a nation can say, "No, we are the way we are because..." and he said, "No." One by one, just argument, just knocking it down.
Right? And so he says as a result of that, verse 5 and 6, what is his judgment? "I will remove its hedge, it shall be devoured, I will break down its wall and it shall be trampled down. I will make it a waste, it shall not be pruned or hoed and briars and thorns shall grow up.
I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon you." Basically, what is he saying? Right? So what does this sound like in the New Testament? Do I have it up there? It's actually right there. Okay? This sounds exactly like what Paul says in Romans chapter 1.
They kept on going to sin, they refused to acknowledge God, so what does he say? He hands them over to their own passions. Right? So, in other words, he says the final judgment is, "I've given you every possibility to come to me." Right? "I've given you everything that you could have possibly needed." In fact, no other nation can claim this.
Right? The Canaanites could not have claimed this, the Assyrians and the Babylonians, they can't claim this. God didn't favour them. Right? If anybody had an excuse, they could have given an excuse, but Israel cannot have an excuse before God, considering what God gave them. Right? So as a result of that, he says, "Well, that's what you want?
I'm going to withdraw my blessing." So the final judgment is, instead of protecting them, you're going to be like everybody else. Right? You're going to be like any other small nation, without my protection. Remember I showed you that map of Israel? And what would it, remember, just kind of use your imagination.
Israel's here, what's up here? Assyria's here, behind that is Persia, eventually they're going to become the superpower, and Babylonians are right here. Right now they're not that big, they're like right here, and Assyria is like right here, and the Persians are kind of looming large over here. What's down here?
Egypt. Egypt. Right? So these are mega nations, these are superpowers. Israel's like right there. A tiny little nation. Right? So the southern kingdom is a little dot over here, the northern kingdom is a little dot over here. So the only reason why they're even significant, why we're even talking about them, is because God was with them.
Otherwise, we probably have to go through history, like what's so magnificent about Israel, other than their religion, that we would be talking about them 3,000 years later? Right? Only reason why is because God was with them. So in other words, what God was saying is, you as a tiny little nation, if I withdraw myself, all of these things that he's saying is going to happen, it's just going to happen.
Because that's what happened to every other nation. Assyrians came up and they bullied everybody else, and then eventually the next bully came, the Babylonians, and they bullied everybody else, and then the Persians came and Persians bullied them, and then the Greeks came and the Greeks bullied them, and then the Romans came and the Romans bullied them.
Right? So all they were was a tiny little speck of a nation, and so God's judgment is, I'm no longer going to protect you. And then you keep running toward these other gods, and you see what these gods will do for you. And so ultimately he says that's the final judgment.
He lays out six different reasons, they all kind of overlap, but each one of them, if you remember as you were going through, there's six different woes that are mentioned in chapter five. Eight through ten is an indictment on greed. He said, "Woe to those who join house to house, who add field to field, until there is no more room, and you are made to dwell alone in the midst of the land." In other words, you may be successful in getting all these houses, but in the end, what's the judgment?
No descendants. There's nobody to live in them. You're going to have all this stuff, but you have nobody to give it to. Eleven through seventeen is a long list of indictments about self-indulgence. So one is greed, this is how their idolatry was expressed, through possessions, through greed, "Woe to those who arise early in the morning, that they may run after strong drink." And basically he's talking about an individual who's just seeking pleasure, self-indulgence.
What can I do to gratify myself today? "They have lyre and harp, tambourines and flute and wine at their feasts, but they do not regard the deeds of the Lord or see the work of his hand." In other words, it's not that God is saying, "Hey, you shouldn't be seeking pleasure." He said, "In the context of seeking pleasure, you forgot who God is." That in the end, ultimately, God ought to be your treasure.
"Therefore, she who has enlarged his appetite and opened his mouth beyond his measure is the nobility of Jerusalem, and her multitude will go down her, revelers and who exalt in her." In other words, he's saying God's going to humble those people who are seeking self-indulgence. 18-19, indulgence or indictment against self-delusion.
So let's look at verse 18 and 19. So the picture here in verse 18 is, "Woe to those who draw iniquity from cords of falsehood, who draw sin as with cards of rope." What does that mean? What does that mean? What is the imagery of verse 18? What is the indictment against them about sin?
When you think of what he's saying here, I want to encourage you, if you read a verse that you're not familiar with, go to the message Bible or go to the contemporary Bible. Now, I'm not saying that that's the right translation, but basically it's the quickest way for you to figure out, "Oh, that's what he meant." Again, I wouldn't tell you to use that as your final resource, but if you're not studying through a commentary, you just kind of want to like, "Oh, what is he saying?
This imagery is kind of strange." Go to the message, what are some, living Bible, what are some other Bibles? Contemporary translation? Yeah, so anyway, those translations are basically commentaries. They've taken anything that's difficult, they translate it so that it would make more sense in English. So, if you look at that verse, what is the imagery?
He's pulling the cart, cart full of sin, right? What is that imagery? What is he saying? Wherever he goes, he's dragging his sin with him, right? He's got a cart load of sin. Wherever he goes, he's dragging it around with him, right? It's not just compartmentalized in one place, wherever he goes, right?
Just like the scripture says, you know, when not to lay hands hastily, it says, "Some men's sins are obvious, some men's sins trail behind them, but they can't escape from their sin. Eventually it will be revealed." And so, that's the imagery that we see in 18. And then he qualifies that even further, he'll say, "Let him be quick, let him speed his work that we may see it.
Let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel draw near and let it come that we may know it." How many of you read that and say, "What?" How many of you read that and just put a question mark? What does he mean by that? Anybody want to give a crack?
Okay, you're just saying like you were one of those people, yeah. It could be, right? How many of you guys thought it that way? That he's saying, "Oh, let God come." No, I think, I read commentaries, that was one of the options. So, imagine, remember what he says about the nation of Israel in chapter 1?
Well, remember in the beginning they're deluded and then at the second part of chapter 1, what does he address? False religion. Like, they're going and giving many sacrifices and he says, "What do they mean to me?" So, they were deluded. They thought that they were right with God. So, they're completely oblivious.
In fact, the next verse says it, right? He says, "They call good evil and evil good." So, their sense of right and wrong is completely perverted, right? So, even their own assessment was wrong. Not only were they dragging sin, I mean, he says, "The imagery is everywhere they go, they're dragging this cart full of sin and even though they're filled with sin, they're standing before God saying, 'Hey, God, come.
Do your work. We want to see you,'" right? Not realizing when God comes, judgment is coming with him. That's how deluded they are. Verse 20, "Indictment against perversion of truth." Again, we read that in verse 20, "Woe to those who call evil good and good evil." That's how deluded they are.
Think about our culture, right? Things that was clearly universally Christian or non-Christian was considered sinful 30 years ago. Now, it's like sinful to call it sin now, right? So, he's again, indicting these people that when God gives you over to your sin, you're going to start justifying your sin.
Remember, I said this so many times, whenever there's guilt on someone's life, either you're going to deal with that guilt somehow, that guilt is going to lead you to repentance. Because the only way to get rid of guilt is by repentance. God can forgive you of your sin and you get rid of that guilt through repentance.
Or you're going to somehow justify the guilt. Either you're going to nullify it and you're going to say, "Well, everybody else does it." Where do you draw the line? And then you start using that language, all of a sudden you're justifying. We look at the scripture and we're so far away from what the scripture says and we're not going to change, so therefore, maybe the way we understand it is wrong.
Maybe my theology is wrong, right? And so, that's basically what they're doing. They're so deep in their sin and they're unwilling to repent and now they're going to call sin good and good sin. Again, the fifth one is indictment against pride. Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and shrewd in their own sight.
So, all of these things together, they're just completely deluded. And then finally, in 22-23, indictment against their vain pride and social injustice. Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine, the things that they boast about, completely frivolous. Think about, you know, think how detailed that he's getting about their sin, right?
Think about the kind of things that we boast about, completely frivolous before. It made me say, "Ah, you know, I don't drink, so I don't qualify for that." But think about a lot of things that we kind of look at as, "Wow, look at that." You know, pride or I'm not going to get into details.
I don't want to offend anybody, you know? But think about how frivolous a lot of things that we get excited about and we boast about, how frivolous that must have been before God, right? And so, he's saying the same thing. You know, these guys are so deluded in their sins, they don't recognize it.
They're asking for God to come, "Oh, we want to see your glory," not realizing that judgment is coming with God, right? They don't even know how to discern what is right and wrong because they've drifted so far away. Even in their own eyes, like saying, "Okay, you know, I'm better than them." Why would these people think they're better?
Well, because they're religious, right? And they're probably comparing with the pagans. They're comparing, "Yes, we worship idols, but we don't sacrifice our children, right? We're not cannibals. We don't go to temples and have orgies," right? So in their eyes, they're comparing with the rest of the world and the debauchery that's out there and say, "Well, we're better than them." So in their eyes, they don't deserve judgment because they're not comparing themselves with God's law.
If they looked at the law carefully, they would see how far they are, but they're comparing themselves with other people, right? So again, he's laying out, again, all of these things are God's indictment against Israel. So when the judgment comes, and you know exactly, here's, you know, before you give a sentence to somebody, the judgment's saying, "Here, you're guilty of this," and they'll read you what you did, right?
And that's basically what God is doing. Therefore, as a result of the rebellion against God, he will bring judgment, and that specific judgment that he says in verse 26 to 30 is that there's going to be a foreign nation that's going to come, and we've been talking about that, right?
So he says he's going to take away the hedge, his protection, and as soon as he withdraws himself, what's going to happen? The bullies are going to come, right? And so that's the description he has from 26 to 30. He says he will raise a signal for nations far away, right?
Those are the, most likely the Assyrians and the Babylonians, and whistle for them from the ends of the earth. Behold, quickly, speedily, they come. So all this, verse 27 to 30, is not a description of Israel. This is a description of the foreign armies that are coming, right? They're going to come with judgment.
None is weary, none stumbles, none slumbers or sleeps, not a waistband is loose, not a sandal strap's broken. So if you don't read this in context, you're going to think like, oh, Israel's pretty, you know, what's wrong with them? They sound pretty good. He's not describing Israel. He's describing people who are coming to destroy them, right?
It's kind of like, you know, like maybe the church is weakened, and when the church is weak, the devil is strong, right? So again, when I was a young Christian, I used to, you know, live in fear of the devil, because it was in a charismatic circle, and they always talked about demons.
And as I was maturing as a Christian, I realized demonic strength is only as strong as I am strong in God, right? Because the Christ in me is much greater, but when the Christ in me is weak, not because Christ is weak, but because I'm greedy in the Holy Spirit, then the demon is going to be very strong, right?
We have no power over demonic force when we are not in right with God. And there is demonic force. That's absolute guarantee. As much as we pray to God, as much as we believe in heaven, there's a hell. As much as we believe in angels, there are demons. The scripture tells us over and over again, right?
So when we are weak, the enemy is very strong. So he's describing the enemy coming to destroy them. So chapter six. I think chapter six is probably the easiest to understand of all the chapters until we get to chapter 53, right? It's like, "Oh, I get this," because you probably heard many messages on this.
But one of the first questions I asked was, "Why is this in chapter six?" Right? That was one of the questions I asked, right? Why is the calling of Isaiah in chapter six? What do you think, what do you naturally would think the calling of Isaiah would be? Chapter one, you would think he would begin with, he called, right?
It starts by saying he ministered or he prophesied during the period of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and then Hezekiah. So here he says Uzziah dies and then Isaiah comes into ministry. So you would think he would begin with that, but he's in chapter six. So again, I think I mentioned this in the beginning of the introduction.
Isaiah is written thematically. It is not written chronologically. So that's one of the reasons. The whole book of Isaiah is not written chronologically. So one, Isaiah is not about ministry of Isaiah. Whole book of Isaiah is not, "Here's Isaiah, this is what he did, this is what he said." It's not about Isaiah.
Isaiah is just a mouthpiece. Secondly, Isaiah is just one of many prophets. All these prophets here, they're all called pre-exilic prophets, meaning before they went to exile, before the Assyrians and the Babylonians came, God sent all these prophets, so one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine prophets.
And all of them had similar messages, right? Because you didn't obey God. So every one of them has their own little insights, right? Isaiah probably being the greatest of all of these prophets, but Isaiah was one of all of these prophets that God sent out, right? Again, Isaiah's calling is in the context of God's bigger story of judgment and restoration.
So it doesn't necessarily need to be chronological because that's not his point. His calling, just to kind of give you a background behind his calling so you understand what's going on, his calling begins at the end of Isaiah's reign. Was Isaiah a good king or a bad king? He was a good king.
Was he good all the way? It doesn't say specifically. High places. Remember when we talked about what are high places? Most likely it was idol worship that he, it says he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, except he didn't remove the high places. So it was true of Uzziah and it was also true of Jotham and then remember Ahaz?
Yeah, he did what was wrong in the eyes of the Lord. He was evil all the way through. How about Hezekiah? Hezekiah is actually good all the way. There's nothing bad said about Hezekiah. He's one of, one of probably one or two that actually stands out in Israel's history as being the good king, right?
And his mistake, if we can call it a mistake, was he begged God to live longer and as a result of that Manasseh comes. Manasseh is actually the worst king, one of the worst kings Israel has. He reigns, Uzziah reigns second longest. He reigned for 52 years. Only one other person reigned longer than him was Manasseh, was 55 years, right?
Which was one of the most evil kings, Manasseh. He reigned the longest. But there's kind of an asterisk to his reign because even though Uzziah reigned 52 years, he didn't remove the high places and as a result of that, it says in 2 Kings 15.4 and on, that as a result of that he was struck with leprosy.
And so he had to be stationed in his home and it doesn't say specifically how many years, but his son Jotham, as soon as he was able, ruled in his stead until he died. So one thing I want to just kind of take a minute to talk about here is, Uzziah is one of the better kings of Israel and he reigns for a long period of time, but God still punishes him for his sin.
He doesn't just say, "You know what, you're good, I'll weigh the bad stuff, I just kind of cover over the bad stuff." He doesn't say that, right? He said he was a good king for the most part, he tried to do what was right, but he didn't obey completely.
So there is no sin in the presence of God where God says, "You know what, I weighed the good and the bad and there's so much good in you that the sin that you have just kind of covers over." Every sin is detestable in the eyes of God and we see that, a perfect example of it is in Uzziah's life.
Here's a king who did what was right, but he didn't fully surrender to God, right? And it's at the end of his life, right? So for the most part, I mean, consider all the bad kings in the northern kingdom, consider out of all the bad kings there's only about eight of them and out of eight of the good kings, only one or two of them is like Hezekiah.
So if you think about it, in Israel's history, this was, was it a good time or a bad time? Considering everything else, this was actually one of the better periods in Israel's history. So think about when God is sending Isaiah to bring judgment upon Israel. He's not just a maneseh, it wasn't just when they were barring their children and, you know, it wasn't just that.
It was during a period when they were worshiping God. There was a lot of temple worship, there was a lot of religiosity, but in the context, they weren't fully surrendered to God. And that's what kind of, he said, "You know what, all the things that he's saying, he's not talking to people that you completely ignored him, you know, you never gave worship, you didn't even care, he doesn't say that.
He says, "You're doing all these religious things thinking that somehow by these religious things it's going to cover over the other sins that you're committing." And basically what God is saying through Isaiah is like, "No, right? Sin has to be atoned for and so the judgment is coming because of the sin that you're allowing." So, in the Old Testament, it's about the, his son reigned in his place because of this disease.
And so the picture you have, this is probably, you've probably heard many sermons on this. In chapter 6, it begins with a scene where he sees the seraphims, angelic creatures. The two wings cover their feet. In the Old Testament, the reason why you cover your feet is because you're in a holy ground, right?
Where is a situation where somebody had to cover their feet or take off their shoes because they were in a holy ground? Moses at the burning bush, right? Two wings cover their face to protect themselves from God's glory. Again with Moses, when he's receiving the law and says, "Let me see you," he says, "If you see me, you will die." So, even these holy creatures in the presence of God has to cover themselves, right?
So his glory was terrifying, right? So if it's terrifying to these angelic angels who doesn't have sin, right? They're not corrupt. They didn't fall. These aren't fallen angels. These are angels without sin. And they're in the presence of a holy God and they're covering their feet and covering their eyes.
So what would happen to a man who is sinful, who actually has sin, right? And that's the scene that we see with Isaiah. Isaiah, again, with two, they're flying around. And if you look at the Old Testament imagery, remember when the priest went into the Holy of Holies, right, the sacred room?
One of the main things is that they could not stay there. They had to do their work and they had to get out because that was where the presence of God was. So no one, only the rightful owner of the mercy seat, who is that? Whose seat is that?
Jesus' seat, right? When Christ comes, he will be the rightful owner of that seat. And until then, he said these high priests would come, they'd do their work, sprinkle the blood and they'd have to get out. So that's the kind of imagery that we see at the throne. These holy creatures are hiding their feet, hiding their face and they're moving around constantly.
And what was their main thing that they're saying? They're worshipping him in his presence. That's their constant presence. They're worshipping, they're serving him, right? So again, as I said, if these holy creatures can't even look at God, they have to cover their feet, they're flying around, holy, holy, holy, right, in the presence of his glory, what would be the response of a sinful man?
And Isaiah, in comparison to the rest of Israel, is holy. But in comparison to God, he's sinful. So the first response, Isaiah recognizes his sin, right? And so where does he recognize his sin? He says, "And the foundations of the threshold," verse four, "shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke." So when God spoke.
So he was watching this scene from a distance and he sees these creatures and he's seeing, but when does the fear come to Isaiah? When God speaks, right? When he speaks, the earth moves and you feel the smoke. And I said, "Woe is me, for I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of people of unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of Hosts." So it's when he speaks and he sees his glory, he's terrified, right?
His recognition of sin goes beyond just his own sin. Like, "I'm a man of unclean lips and I am from people of unclean lips." Who are the people he's referring to? Israel, right? So he's going to be a prophet who's going to be sent, right, to represent him to this unclean people and that's the first thing that he recognizes.
Before he becomes a prophet of God to be sent, he needs to recognize who he's talking to. He needs to know who he is and he needs to know who he's talking to. And both, he says, "I'm a sinner, talk to the sinners." Right? And that's what he recognized first and foremost.
So again, any representative of God is representing a holy, holy, holy God. And his primary work is to reconcile that sinner to himself. So if the man who's preaching doesn't recognize his sin or he doesn't recognize the primary problem of the people he's preaching to is sin, then he can't properly represent God.
Because anything he gives to those people, whether sin is not atoned for, is absolutely useless. Right? So that's the first thing he sees. He's in the presence of his glory, he recognizes his, he's terrified. I think, those of you guys read the book Holiness of God, I think the way that R.C.
Sproul explains it, the word "woe" is undone. Right? Undone. In other words, I'm dead. Right? That's the term. Woe is me, woe is me. I am dead. How can I possibly be in his presence and live? If these holy creatures can't look upon the glory of God, right? If Moses can only see the glimpse of him going, how can I possibly be in his presence and have seen and heard his voice and live?
And so he's like, woe is me, woe is me. I am done. Right? Which he would have been if God didn't do what happens after that. So what happens? He takes a call and he atones for his sin. Without that atonement, he would have died. Just like any one of us.
Going to think that we're going to be in the presence of this God and we're going to live. Only by the atonement of God. So the work, so he calls him, he prepares him. You know, who's going to go for me? He says, here am I, send me. And then here's the crazy part.
He says, well, you're going to go for me? And they said, keep on hearing, but do not understand. Keep on seeing, but do not perceive. Make the heart of this people dull and their ears heavy and blind their eyes. Let's say, see with their eyes, hear with their ears and understand with their hearts and turn and be healed.
And he goes on and says, you know, how long do you want me to do this? I mean, that's a question that anybody would ask. I'm surprised he didn't change his mind. I hear my, send me Lord. I was like, okay, now I'm going to go for me. You're going to preach to these people.
They're not going to listen. They're going to harden their hearts. They're going to be blind. You know, like, okay, how long? Until the judgment is complete. Until everything, everything that I said is going to happen, happens. You stay to it. Why, why would God send a prophet if the end conclusion of it is judgment?
Is justified in his judgment? Yes. Like what you talked about in the beginning of like, there's no, you know, this is kind of, you know, it'll, it'll bleed over to the text that we're going to be looking at in Romans, in chapter three, where God's glory, when we think of God being glorified, how do we normally talk about it?
When we say, oh God, so glorify Jesus, glorify Jesus, what do we normally talk about? His mercy, his kindness, grace, compassion. That's what we normally think about. But do we, have you ever thought about glorifying God in his wrath, in his judgment, in his condemnation, that God is glorified even in hell?
Because what does glorify mean? To magnify, right? To take something and then put it on a pedestal and shine light on it. That's what glorify means, right? So when Jesus is, Jesus on the cross glorifies the Father, does he just glorify his mercy and love? No, his wrath, his judgment, his justice, his holiness, all of that is magnified on the cross.
All of that together is magnified, right? So the fact that God says if you sin, judgment is coming, when God carries out his justice, that is also glory to God. So ministry is not simply, again this is something that I really had to come to terms with years back when I was wrestling with ministry, that ministry is not simply declaring his mercy and only seeing people fall in love with his mercy.
It's falling in love with God himself. Falling in love with his mercy and his holiness. If somebody is attracted to his mercy and yet is not attracted to his holiness, that's not God. You can't separate those two things. That's why somebody who says I'm in love with Christ because he's so compassionate and loving and merciful but holiness is something that he's done.
The reason why Christians desire sanctification is because there's an attraction to his holiness as well. There's a desire to be like him. He's glorified in every way, in his holiness and his justice. So it's not just, I'm sending you to them because I want you to magnify my mercy and his holiness and his holiness is doing great but he says I'm going to send you to them.
These people aren't going to listen. He's not taking innocent people and then hardening their heart. What is he doing? In fact I think there's a passage. Turn your Bible, we talked about this earlier, to chapter 2. Remember what we said about here? Look at verse 10. Talking about his mercy and justice.
Enter into the rock and hide in the dust from before the terror of the Lord and from the splendor of his majesty. How is his majesty described? So terror of the Lord and the splendor of the majesty is the same thing. How many times has he mentioned that? Verse 19.
And the people shall enter the caves of the rocks and the holes of the ground from before the terror of the Lord and from the splendor of his majesty when he rises to terrify the earth. So he says his terror is described as splendor of his majesty. Again in verse 21.
To enter the caverns of the rocks and the cliffs of the cliffs from before the terror of the Lord and from the splendor of his majesty when he rises to terrify the earth. So his terror and his splendor of majesty is described as the same thing. So God's glorification is not just one side, the things that we want.
God's glorification is his whole being. So even in his judgment against Israel, he sends his prophets to declare his glory. Think about the contrast. Jonah's ministry was only about 30, 40 years before this happens where Isaiah does the ministry. Remember what happens in Jonah? He says to the nation of Israel, I'm going to send you to them and they're going to harden their hearts.
They're going to be blind. They're not going to listen. They're going to be hard of hearing and they're not going to repent. How long do I do this? Until the judgment comes and it actually gets carried out. So compare this to Nineveh. This pagan nation, mutilating people, hated by the nations and yet this reluctant prophet warns them about the judgment of God.
What happens with them? This pagan nation repents. God repents. Even this pagan nation, even the one that Jonah says, no, they deserve all the judgment, but when they repent, God forgives them. This happens, again, his ministry was, so right here, 793 to 753 BC. Remember Isaiah's ministry? Remember the dates?
Yeah, so it's about 30, 40, 50 years possibly removed from this. So it's only one generation prior to Isaiah where this pagan nation was willing to repent but he says, but my people, right? Even though they have all the advantage I gave them, they become so hardened that they won't repent when a prophet comes.
In fact, God did it. God sent one reluctant prophet to Nineveh. He sent 10. He sent 10 of them pleading with the nation of Israel to repent and they wouldn't repent. They could not recognize their sin, right? And the false prophets would come and say, God's not angry with you.
Why would he be angry with you? You're God's people. Look at all the sacrifices you've given. Look at this beautiful temple. Why would God be angry with you? So again, all of this is to stack up evidence against the nation of Israel. The judgment is coming and there's nobody who's going to stand before God saying this is not fair.
The bad news to the nation of Israel at the end of chapter 6, he says, the judgment's going to be so complete and though a tenth remain in it, it will be burned again. So even after the judgment comes, only a tenth remain, right? A tenth of all of Israel, only then will remain, but even the tenth is going to be burnt up.
It's going to be thorough and complete, like a terabith or on an oak whose stump remains when it is felled. So in other words, the bad news is that the judgment's going to be so thorough, there's nothing going to be left but a stump. But the good news is that stump that's going to remain is a holy seed, Jesus.
And the only reason why the nation of Israel has any hope is because he leaves a stump of Jesus. The only reason why 3,000 years later, this tiny little nation could have been squashed and we never would have heard of, like Israel, what is Israel? You know, you'd have to go back and take history lessons or be a history major to even know who they were.
And the only reason why we are still talking about them today, why they even have significance in modern history is because God's presence was with them, right? Why they didn't disappear. Think about a tiny little nation with all those superpowers. They're not like way over here, they're surrounded by them, right?
They're surrounded by Egyptians, the Persians, the Babylonians, the Assyrians, the Romans, the Greeks, they're surrounded by these superpowers that are fighting each other and just a bomb going astray in modern illustration. One of these bombs that they're bombing with just went astray and hit them by accident, they would have been gone.
That's how tiny this nation was, right? But in God's redemptive history, they're superpowers. And the only reason why is because he left a stump, a remnant of the nation of Israel. Now I'm not going to go off tangent here, but to me, when we talk about God's faithfulness, and I know there's a whole different theology saying that Israel has been replaced by the church, I don't believe that.
I believe that God has a place of nation of Israel. The fact that they still exist today is a testament to the promises that he has that meant much of what he's saying to them is still future. We're going to see that restored in the second coming. But again, all of this, right now he's going to reintroduce the stump which is Jesus and then you know where the prophecy is going in chapter seven, about that he's going to leave a sign, the virgin's going to have a child, and then he's going to go into more of the Messianic prophecies.
And so he says, "Here's the indictment, the judgment is going to be thorough, there's not a single person who can stand before God and be justified, and you would have been completely wiped out if it wasn't for the fact that I made a covenant that the offspring of the woman's going to come and crush the head of the serpent, and we're not done with this yet." He's coming, right?
And then so he begins to introduce the hope that's in Christ. As he is prophesying about the judgment, the hope in Christ is going to be slowly starting to creep into his prophecies. All right, that's it. Okay, so if you guys can take some time with your small group to discuss.