Isaiah chapter 32. Isaiah 32, we'll look at verses
6 through 20, but I want to read verses 1 through 5 and then just
kind of start in verse 6 and look at the language as we go. Behold, a king shall reign in
righteousness, and princes shall rule in judgment. And remember,
the context of this is to see all of the wicked rulers that
we see in all of the book of Isaiah. But there's one king
that's not wicked. There's one king that rules in
righteousness. And a man shall be as an hiding place. A hiding place from what? Again,
the language of all of the book of Isaiah is destruction and
misery and famine and woe and war and every judgment. But there's a place to hide.
And it's a man, a person. The man Christ Jesus. a hiding place from the wind,
a covert from the tempest, and as rivers of water in a dry place,
as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land. And the eyes
of them that see shall not be dim, and the ears of them that
hear, there are those that see and hear, and they shall hearken. The heart also of the rash shall
understand knowledge. and the tongue of the stammerer
shall be ready to speak plainly. The foul person shall be no more
called liberal, nor the churl said to be bountiful. This prophecy
given of the righteous king, who's a hiding place, a covert,
a river, and a rock. And in much of the rest of the
chapter, in the next section that we'll read, we'll see why
we need him to be all of this to us. He's everything that we need.
The evil of the fool is revealed and the consequences of our evil
are seen in these next several verses. In verse five, one of
the results of Christ's righteous reign over his kingdom and his
setting up of his princes, his people, his preachers, you could
say, but really all of his witnesses to dispense discernment and justice,
one of the results of all of that, his reigning particularly. is that a fool will no longer
be called honorable, he said in verse 5. It's not going to
be that way anymore. Religious leaders who are vile,
lying, reprobates will be exposed to be vile, lying, reprobates. You see, the world tends to call
them You know, great men and honorable, venerable, the venerable
so-and-so and doctor and reverend and all this kind of thing. God
calls them hypocrites, snakes, blind leaders of the blind and
said they actually want to and try to bar sinners from entering
the kingdom of God. They devour widows' houses. They
are the scum of the earth. They are the lowest of the low.
They are the thing that God hates most. You know, religion talks about
how God loves everybody. There's nothing God hates like
a Pharisee. He exposed them for what they
were, and his gospel still does that. Who these fools are is made clear
in verse 6. Look at it, let's begin there
now. For the vile person will speak villainy." Who's he talking
about? Well, it's somebody that speaks. And his heart will work
iniquity to practice hypocrisy and to utter error against the
Lord. They're not just talking foolishness about worldly things. They're talking foolishness about
God. To make empty the soul of the hungry and he will cause
the drink of the thirsty to fail. The instruments also of the churl
are evil. Verse 7, he deviseth wicked devices
to destroy the poor with lying words, even when the needy speaketh
right. A sinner does not know God, does
not understand his word. A sinner which can only know that which the flesh discerns.
A sinner that understands not that which alone God can reveal. All he knows to be true is lies. And therefore everything he says
is wrong when he speaks about God. Everything he says, you've
heard this and you've witnessed this and you've been this. I
have too. And in the specific lies that
are taught in our day, we've talked about this I think in
the last lesson, There are specific things that they teach generally
in our day. God loves everybody. Christ died
to save everybody. You have a free will. Salvation
is up to you. All lies and damnable lies. Vitally, they're lies of consequence. You just need to do the right
things and you'll be saved. You know, salvation is up to
you. The truth is that God's love
is in Christ alone. Nowhere else that God is a consuming
fire. He's the holy God who must and
shall punish all sin. And that's not, you see, they
talk about, well, God loves the sinner and hates the sin. No,
there's no such thing as sin apart from a sinner. Thou hatest
all workers of iniquity, David said in Psalm 5, I believe it is. The holy God must put you in
hell. And the only exceptions to that
are those in Christ, the remnant. The truth is that Christ came
and was born in human flesh, was born of a woman, made under
the law that he might redeem them that were under the law,
so that he might live and die for those whom God chose to salvation
from the foundation of the world. There's nothing that could be
more clearly taught than that, than the fact that that is taught
in scripture. The truth is that no man can or shall come to Christ
unless God Almighty causes them to, by sovereign grace and power,
through the gift of supernatural faith in Christ. And I say supernatural
in the sense it's not natural to you. It's a miracle. It's a miracle of God. The truth
is that you never have done anything good. They say, oh, well, your
good just has to outweigh your bad. You've never done anything
good, and you never will. You will never come to God. God
looked down on the children of men, Psalm 53, 2, to see if there
were any that did understand and did seek God, and there wasn't
a single blasted one that did. That's what he saw. And God saved
some of them anyway. That's the truth of it. God saved
some of them anyway. He saved people that would not
come to him. and caused them, caused them. David wrote in Psalm 65, for
blessed is the man whom thou choosest and causes to approach
unto thee. And the effect according to verse
6 of the preaching of lies by those who do not know God is
that those who truly do hunger and thirst after righteousness
will never get what they need from them. They'll never get
what they need that way by the preaching of lies. Christ is
the only meat and drink for those who are hungry that way. spiritually
hungry for the righteousness of God. And they must hear of
him who alone satisfies the hungry soul of the sinner. Now think
of this. They hunger and thirst. That's
what we saw in our text there. They hunger and thirst. But these
liars, they starve those that are hungry. They deny those that
are thirsty. Our Lord said, blessed are they
that hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall
be filled. They shall be filled, but not
by these guys. What is hunger and thirst? Well, it's a need,
isn't it? It's a need. And it's a need
that only God can satisfy. Your body can't produce what
it needs. It seeks it outside of itself. Now, men are involved in doing
things to gather and prepare food, but take away what God
freely gives, and there's nothing. Take away his sunshine for a
little while. Take away his rain for a little while. Take away
the seed. He provides that. Take away everything
that he gives and there's no food, there's no water. You can't
produce water. No man can ever duplicate it. God made water one time and we're
still drinking the same water that he made before the flood. That's why he uses those things
to illustrate Salvation this is where Christ said I am the
bread of life Because that bread comes down from heaven. He said
I am the living water my flesh is meat indeed and my blood is
drink indeed He said in John 6 27 Labor not for the meat which
perisheth But for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life
Which the Son of Man shall give you For him hath God the Father
sealed. Now think about this. Look at a verse with me. I want
you to turn to this one, John 6, 51. And look at it with me closely.
Think about what's being said and what it's teaching. John
6, 51. He said, I am the living bread
which came down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread,
he shall live forever. And the bread that I give, that
I will give, is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the
world. Now you know what he's talking
about when he says, I will give my flesh. for the life. If there's
going to be life, if anyone's going to have life, it's because
I give my flesh. He's talking about laying down
his life. He's talking about what this wine and bread represent
right down here. And he said, I am the living
bread. And if any man eat of this bread,
in other words, if you partake of him, Christ crucified, Christ
on the cross, Christ, the Redeemer, who shed his precious blood for
sinners. That's who he says, I'm going to give my life so
that there can be life. Partaking of him is life. And
we do that by faith. We lay hold of him by faith.
We are made partakers of Christ and of his sufferings by faith
in him. To believe on him is to eat his
flesh and to drink his blood. In the character of Him as the
Lamb of God that takes away sin. We own Him and take Him within
ourselves as the Redeemer of sinners. I know that the only
way I can stand before God righteous is if Christ, Christ in me is
the hope of my glory, the Christ who shed His blood for me. That's
what he's saying there. So this life-giving food and
water though, it won't be had by or through those that tell
lies about God. And notice who he is in verse
6 again. Look at verse 6 again back in Isaiah 32. And this is important that we
look at this specifically. For the vile person will speak
villainy. What he says is the problem.
What did he say about the Pharisees? Don't do anything they did. As
in the sense that they taught the law, he said, now you follow
them in that. But don't do anything that they
did, because they say and do not. That's what he said. But
what they say is also the problem now when it comes to the false
gospel. When they speak about trusting
in your law keeping, everything that they said now about that. And what he says, what this, it's also what they don't say.
What they say, it also includes what they don't
say. It's what they say without saying the truth of God. But words, remember that words
are the instruments of their villainy. And then secondly,
these lies, they come from a heart of evil. Also in verse, his heart
will work iniquity. The Lord said, they draw nigh
unto me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. Drawing nigh with the lips is
not talking about telling the truth. But you know, they would
say, we love God. They said to him, God is our
father. He said, if God were your father, you'd love me. But
they drew nigh to him with their lips that way. They said, God
is our father. You know, we love God. We serve God. No. Their heart He said, basically
what he's saying there is if what you say is true, that God
were your father, your heart would be in on it. You'd love
me, you see. But it's just words with no heart. And then they're hypocrites.
Our Lord, how many times did he call them that? To practice
hypocrisy and to utter error against the Lord. They have people
fooled, don't they? They represent themselves as
something that they're not. They come as messengers of God.
But God says, I didn't send them. They speak not according to the
words of this prophecy. It's because there's no light
from God in them. They come pretending to do you good, but they're murderers
of men's souls. They are highly respected and
regarded and rewarded by men. But God says they're villains
here in this text. He calls them villains. And then
they lie on God. Look at it. Same verse. They
utter error against the Lord is the next phrase. You know,
who cares what their opinion is on current events? But when
a man presumes to speak for God, he better say what God said.
And then finally, they leave their hearers empty. They make
empty the soul of the hungry. And God takes that very personally.
If you read the chapter 34 of the book of Ezekiel, it talks
about how God feels about shepherds who feed themselves and not the
flock of God. He says, I'm against you. Let
me tell you something about that. If God before us, nobody can
be against us. But what if God's against you?
Who's going to help you? That kind of goes both ways,
doesn't it? In verse seven, they devise wicked
things to destroy the poor. They devise things. They have
invitations. You know, they make things. Where's
that in the Bible? Having an invitation, you know, inviting,
let's get everybody down to the front to get all weepy and make
some decisions for God. Where'd that come from? They
invented it. That's what he's talking about,
devising things. And religion has always done
that. Why do they do that? Because people like that kind
of stuff. That's why. People like that kind of stuff.
They build great facilities because people like that. They reward
and brag on sinners instead of honoring and exalting Christ.
They have entertainment in place of true worship. They show movies
and have plays instead of expounding the word of God. They don't really
make any bones about it anymore. I heard old Osteen say one time
in an interview, folks don't lack doctrine so we give them
what they want. All right then, at least he's honest about it.
They fashion their religion in a way that's attractive to the
flesh and feeds the flesh as they starve the soul. Even when
the needy speaketh right, it says, when the needy speaketh
right. Think about that. The ones that they're starving,
they know better, don't they? I've thought of several examples
of that. The man in John chapter nine, which was born blind. He didn't know very much. They
asked him, is this man a sinner? We know he's a sinner. And he
said, well, I don't know about that. But here's what I know. I was
blind, and then he made me see. Now I can see. He knew more than
all those Pharisees, those doctors of divinity put together, didn't
he? That's what that's saying there at the end of that verse.
That's Needy speaking right. The theologians don't know God.
They wouldn't know him if they met him at the supermarket. In verse 8, but the liberal deviseth
liberal things. And remember this word liberal
means princely and generous. He deviseth things according
to that. The princely honorable man devises
honorable things. This is the man that God sends
to feed and refresh his sheep. With regard to that, read Romans
chapter 12. And that'll make a lot of sense
with regard to that verse. But look at verses nine through
14. Rise up, you women that are at ease. Hear my voice, you careless
daughters. Give ear unto my speech. Many
days and years shall you be troubled, you careless women, for the vintage
shall fail, the gathering shall not come. Tremble, you women
that are at ease. Be troubled, you careless ones.
Strip you and make you bare, and gird sackcloth upon your
loins. They shall lament for the teats, for the pleasant fields,
for the fruitful vine. Now think about that. They're
starving people, but God says you're the one that's gonna starve.
No fruit, the harvest is not coming in. I'm gonna dry it up. Upon the land of my people shall
come up thorns and briars, yea, upon all the houses of joy in
the joyous city. And remember now, he brings this
upon his people His earthly people, Israel, as a picture. And that's judgment upon some,
that's condemnation upon some. But He also deals that way in
mercy, doesn't He? He'll dry up your field in order
to cause you to cry to Him. Or He may just be sealing your
condemnation that way. He'll use it for both. It's the
savor of life to some, the savor of death to others, what He does
and what He says. Because the palaces shall be
forsaken, the multitude of the city shall be left, the forts
and towers shall be for dens forever, a joy of wild asses,
a pasture of flocks. You beautiful cities that you've
built and raised up in sin and rebellion and pride against God,
the wild beasts are going to live in them and they're going
to enjoy them. This describes, as we've seen
so often in this book, the desolation of the wicked, They that deprived
God's people of food and water and made themselves fat, they
are themselves gonna starve. They're gonna be starved by God.
And God will see that his sheep are fed in spite of them. Look in Ezekiel 34. I told you
to read that. Ezekiel chapter 34, verse 11. God's gonna see that his she
they're not gonna be fed by these by these reprobates But they're
gonna be fed Ezekiel 34 11 for thus saith the Lord God behold
I even I will both Search my sheep and seek them out as a
shepherd seeketh out his flock in the day that he is among his
sheep That are scattered. So will I seek out my sheep and
will deliver them out of all places Where they've been scattered
in the cloudy and dark day And remember the Lord's the one that
brought the cloudy and dark day. He's the one that brought that
that that famine. And the trouble upon them which
was judgment upon some but mercy to others mercy to the sheep.
And I will bring them out from the people and gather them from
the countries and will bring them to their own land and feed
them upon the mountains of Israel by the rivers and in all the
inhabited places of the country. I will feed them. In a good pasture,
and upon the high mountains of Israel shall their foal be. There
shall they lie in a good fold, and in a fat pasture shall they
feed upon the mountains of Israel. So you see, God just overturns
everything that man does. The wicked Pharisees fed themselves
and starved the sheep, and God said, I'm going to starve you,
and I'm going to make sure they have everything they need to
eat. And then so. So he just turns it all around
for his people. Though these false shepherds
God's gonna bring desolation upon them And he's gonna make
his sheep to lie down in green pastures verse 15 Until the spirit
be poured upon us from on high and the wilderness be a fruitful
field and the fruitful field be counted for a forest So here
it is. God's bringing famine He's going
to dry it up. He's going to make their beautiful
cities to just be homes for wild beasts, bringing it all to an
end. The party's over. How many times
have we seen that in the Word of God? And then he said, until
the Spirit be poured upon us from on high. And here's what
happens then. The wilderness, the sheep who
were being starved, the ones who were in the wilderness, it's
going to be a fruitful field. And the fruitful field, the false
shepherds that are feeding themselves, is going to be a forest, a wilderness. He's going to turn it all around.
When God's Spirit now, and understand this, this is important because
this is just a simple lesson with regard to understanding
the Word of God. Always remember that God's Word
doesn't say a lot of things. It says the same thing a lot
of times. and in a lot of ways. And so
when it says, until such time, until the spirit be poured, that's
a picture now. It's not so much a time, you
know, and the reason I say that and it, a time is pictured. There's a, there's a time of
desolation and then there's a time of prosperity that comes. It's
a picture. And as we see in Ezekiel 34, The false shepherds are made
fat, the flock are starved, and God turns that completely around
here. The spiritual reality is that the wicked are desolate
and the sheep are well fed, and that's always true. We've been
lying in green pastures for a long time, haven't we? By the still
waters, the Lord is our shepherd and not men. We never have depended
upon men to give us what we need. That's a picture. What I mean
by this not being a matter of time is simply this. God's reality
is always this. God works these earthly events
to picture spiritual truths. There were various times when
this The city of Jerusalem, when the
Jews were in desolation and suffering, and there were other times of
prosperity. And God uses this to picture spiritual truths,
and this is important, so I want to be clear about it. The commentators
are contending and arguing over whether this coming down of the
Spirit, the pouring out of the Spirit, well, that's Pentecost,
you know, that's what happened at Pentecost. And others are
saying, no, it can't be that because of the other language
there, because of the context. It's got to be some later dispensation
when God will restore the earthly Jews to faith in Him. But these
are all just vain theories. God manipulates these earthly
times of desolation and prosperity and speaks of judgment and restoration
to teach this simple truth. Each and every sinner is under
the judgment and wrath of God by nature. No matter how prosperous
and happy they appear in this life, no matter how they seem
to have manipulated things into their favor, things are not in
their favor. What our Lord said to the church
at Laodicea applies to every sinner by nature. He said in
Revelation 3.17, Because you say, I am rich and increased
with goods and have need of nothing, and knowest not that thou art
wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked. The Pharisees thought, boy, look
how God's prospering us. No, God's not prospering you. This is our case. We think we're
doing pretty good until God's Spirit is poured out upon us.
And then what does God's Spirit do when God's Spirit comes? What does He do? You know, He
always has done the same thing. He says what the Lord told us
in the New Testament, what He was going to do. You know what?
What he's going to do is what he's been doing, because he don't
change. And he said what he's going to
do is he's going to take the things of man and reveal them to you. He's been doing that from the
start. He did that for Abel. He did that for Moses. The Holy
Spirit of God revealed Christ to them in the Old Testament
scripture. In the truth of God that was
revealed to them then. They knew Christ, they believed
on Christ, and trusted Christ. A sinner's only been saved, ever
been saved one way, by grace through faith in Christ. And
so the Spirit is poured out upon us, and He reveals Christ to
us and in us, and we see what was really true all along. You
see that? We not only see it, but we experience
it. God's sheep are eternally blessed. Even when it looked like we weren't
blessed, we were blessed. You see that? It's not like it
doesn't have to be the Pentecost. This is the teaching of all the
Word of God. This is always true. By nature,
we're desolate. Even though we're fat and happy,
we're beggars. We just don't know it. And then
when God's spirit reveals Christ to us, we realize that as his
sheep, we've always been fed. We've always been taken care
of. His goodness and his mercy have been pursuing me all the
days of my life. Before I believed on him, when
I believed on him, and since I believed on him. He was gracious to me and Christ
from eternity. I just hadn't experienced it
yet. But when His Spirit comes, I do. We experience His eternal
blessing. We're blessed in heavenly places
in Christ Jesus. When? From the beginning, He
said in Ephesians 1. And when we see Him revealed
by His Spirit through the preaching of His gospel, then we're able
to sing. We know from our hearts, from
experience, out of my bondage, sorrow, and night. Jesus, I come
into thy freedom, gladness, and light. I come to thee out of
my sickness, into thy health, out of my want, and into thy
wealth, out of my sin, and into thyself. Jesus, I come to thee. So you see these, what men call
dispensations, and these times of desolation and judgment, and
then times of prosperity, and the way that the Lord uses Everything,
he's just showing us how he saves a sinner. He's showing us what
man is by nature without Christ, even though he looks prosperous.
Like the man in Psalm 73, he thought, boy, there ain't nothing,
the wicked don't ever suffer anything. And then he realized
he didn't want to tread places with him. So he's just teaching there the
same thing he teaches everywhere. The difference between desolation
and prosperity is Christ, not a time, not an event. The difference is a person. Verses
16 through 20. Then judgment shall dwell in
the wilderness and righteousness remain in the fruitful field. You see, he turns the fruitful
field into a wilderness, and his judgment is upon them. He
turns the wilderness into a fruitful field, and what's upon them?
The righteousness of God. Righteousness. And the work, verse 17, of righteousness
shall be peace, and the effect of righteousness, quietness and
assurance. Forever this king that rules
in righteousness. What is the effect of that righteousness? You see how that ties back to
verse one? Why is there righteousness dwelling in that in that? fruitful
field Because the king is over that fruitful field. He's on
the throne there And the work of his righteousness is what
peace And the effect of it quietness and assurance. We'll talk about that in a minute.
Well, let's just talk about it now, why not? Righteousness is
work. What is his work of righteousness? Peace. He made peace by the blood
of his cross. He worked it. He accomplished
it. Reconciliation between God and
the sinner. That's the work of righteousness.
He made peace between us and God. And we see that in the word
of God. Peace with God for sinners is
a work accomplished by Christ crucified. Listen to it in Colossians
119. For it pleased the Father that
in Christ should all fullness dwell. And having made peace
through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things
to himself. By him I say, whether they be
things in earth or things in heaven, and you that were at
one time alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works,
yet now hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through
death. The work of his righteousness
is that you're reconciled with God. To present you holy and
unblameable and unreprovable in his sight. That's why there's
peace between you and God, because there's no sin. All right, now
what's the effect of that peace? Rest, quietness. Quietness and
assurance. I'm resting, and I have reason
to believe, I've got real good reason to believe that I always
will rest in Him. I'll never have to worry about
any assurance. He's sufficient right now, and
I just reckon He always will be. Verse 18 emphasizes, look at
verse 18, and my people shall dwell in a peaceable habitation
and in sure dwellings and in quiet resting places. That emphasizes
the certainty that what he came to do is done. He made peace by his blood between
us and God. And that peace is actually enjoyed
and experienced by those he made it for. You see that? They shall
dwell. His work of righteousness is
peace and they're going to dwell in peace. He did it. He finished
it. He accomplished it. Verse 19,
when it shall hail coming down on the forest and the city shall
be in a low place. Notice that the hail comes down
on the wilderness, not on the fruitful field. Even as God's judgment is falling
upon those around us. What did he say? 10,000 will
fall. A thousand will fall at your left hand and ten thousand
at your right hand, but you've got nothing to worry about. Even as his judgment is falling
upon those around us, his goodness and mercy are pursuing us yet
all the days of our lives. because of that work of righteousness
that he accomplished for us. He reconciled us to God, he made
peace by his precious blood. And then verse 20, blessed are
you that sow beside all waters, and that send forth thither the
feet of the ox and the ass. Now think about this just generally.
You could sit there and worry about what does that ox and ass
mean? Well, that's what you did when
you harvested. You sent in the ox and the ass, They harvest
it and they, blessed are ye, in other words, when you sow
beside all waters. Blessed are you that labor not
for that meat which perisheth. You labor, you sow by the waters. The true spiritual river whose
waters give life. And it's all the water that there
is. So it says all waters. There isn't any other water.
It's a river in a desert place. The true spiritual river, which
is Christ, the source of all blessing to you, the source of
life. You sow by that river. You sow there and you reap, signified
by those animals. You reap. You sow. And of course the plowing and
all that, the animals are the work of it. Here we are in this
world, sowing and reaping, working, laboring. But not like everybody does.
You see, by God's grace we've sown by the waters. The source of all life. He is
all that we have and He is all that we need. If that's true
of you, this verse says, blessed are you, happy are you. Thank God for the water, the
Lord Jesus Christ. Well, let's observe the table