May the Lord be pleased to bless
us together this morning as we turn his word. Let us come to
the prophecy of Isaiah chapter 66 and we'll read the first two
verses. The prophecy of Isaiah chapter
66 and verses one and two. Thus saith the Lord, the heaven
is my throne. and the earth is my footstool. Where is the house that ye built
unto me, and where is the place of my rest? For all those things
hath mine hand made, and all those things have been, saith
the Lord. But to this man will I look,
even to him that is poor, and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth
at my word. We should be thankful to know
that the word of God is written for all generations and we can
bless God today that we have in the Word of God, such situations
which speak to us today, in the current world in which we live,
in our individual cases, in our church situations. And to think
that we have therefore the Word of God to direct us in so many
true and right ways. And of course, one of the great
needs is, to be able to come and to worship God, and to be
able to come and to worship God in a right way and not a wrong
way. There always have been false
worshippers. There always have been hypocritical
worshippers. There have been those who have
been described as whited sepulchres, who just appear alright on the
outside, but are all wrong inside. And so, throughout the Word of
God, there are so many occasions when the Lord speaks and reminds
us of the necessity of having a right motive, a right desire,
a right concern, a right objective, with regard to our true worship. And I believe that as we are
examined by the Word of God, we will see that in our lives,
individually, there are those things which are not perhaps
as they should be. And sometimes we can very easily
set ourselves up as a standard We might almost think sometimes
as a standard of perfection. And what a danger it is to set
ourselves up as a standard rather than the Word of God as the standard. Well, in these verses this morning,
and perhaps the first four verses in this 66th chapter of Isaiah,
the Lord addresses Israel, Judah and of course the whole Church
of God. And he shows to us the greatness
of himself and how important it is and necessary that all
of us continually have a right appreciation of the greatness
of our God. And how we fail very often. Because
I'm sure if we really recognised the greatness of our God more,
our lives would be very different. Because we would be continually
bowing down before the Lord God and earnestly seeking to walk
before him in the light of his countenance, to be directed by
the Holy Spirit and to be given grace to walk carefully and prayerfully
in the ordained way describes to us in the Word of God of those
who are pilgrims and strangers on the earth, those who are professing
Christians and those who should be found not following their
own inclination but desiring to follow the blessed and glorious
example set before us principally through the life of our Lord
Jesus Christ and those whose lives have also been enumerated
to indicate to us and to clearly direct us in those things which
are right and therefore to be concerned to follow the right
way. And in order to be blessed with
that path, that path will bring, without any doubt, honour and
glory to our God. Surely that is, and should be,
and must be, the continual concern of our lives. And yet, sadly
today, It does not seem to be so in many, many cases, I suppose. It's to all of us, to a large
extent. But to many today, the things
of their own situation seem to dominate their lives, and there
seems to be little concern for the honour and glory of God.
Little concern. Well, here we have The direction
here by Isaiah to these Israelites and the words of God are to direct
us to the greatness of God then. As the Lord says, thus saith
the Lord. And of course we read, thus saith
the Lord. The Lord here is in capital letters,
it means Jehovah. The heaven is my throne and the
earth is my footstool. That just gives us directly a
little view of the greatness of God who is in heaven. The heaven of heavens cannot
contain the greatness of Almighty God. And then the Lord asked
the question, where is the house that you build unto me and where
is the place of my rest? For all those things hath mine
hand made, and all those things have been saith the Lord." And
then we have a description of those whom the Lord will favour,
those whom the Lord will bless, and it's a very succinct statement. We're told, to this man will
I look. Perhaps we desire, I hope we
do, that the Lord will look upon us and remember us. Well, the word here tells us,
to this man will I look even. Then there's a description of
this person. To him that is poor and of a
contrite spirit and that trembleth at my word. Well we have three
words, poor, contrite and one that trembles. And that describes
a person to whom the Lord will look. And this word poor can
also be described as someone who is depressed. And that can
of course be depressed with ourselves. Content not satisfied but depressed
with our failures Well, we come back to that to him that is poor
and then to him that is of a contrite spirit and again contrite can
be described as someone who is dejected And so looking at ourselves
again, are we dejected because of our failure in our spiritual
life, failure in the example that we give to others. Does
it mean then that we are contrite? And then finally, one that trembleth
at my word. And trembling is one who can
be described as one who is fearful and one who is reverent. and
one who is afraid to offend Almighty God. Well, that's very briefly
a description. Let me just move on for a moment,
we'll come back to those words. And then the Lord speaks and
he says, he describes people, he that killeth an ox is as if
he slew a man. He that sacrifices a lamb is
as if he cut off a dog's neck. He that offereth an oblation,
as if he offered swine's blood. He that burneth incense, as if
he blessed an idol. Yea, they have chosen their own
ways, and their soul delighteth in their abominations. We can imagine, can we not, in
Old Testament days, a person bringing an ox, proudly. What a wonderful creature I've
got here. Look how good I am at bringing this sacrifice. What a wonderful person I am.
Not really in that way described previously. And you see such
a view, such a position, as the Lord says, They are delighting
in such an abomination, which it is. It's an abomination to
Almighty God to come and to pretend, as this was, to worship God. And it's so today, in a very
different way. But there are those who pretend
to be a very avid and loyal and good worshipper. And yet they
don't have a right attitude at all. They haven't really come
hungry and thirsty for the bread and water of life. They come
so that they might be thought well of. They come, as it were,
to make a good impression. Well, the Lord says, Yea, they
have chosen their own ways, and their soul delighteth in their
abominations. The Lord goes on, I also will
choose their delusions and will bring their fears upon them,
because when I called, none did answer. When I spake, they did
not hear, but they did evil before mine eyes and chose that in which
I delighted not. These are very straightforward
words, aren't they? The Word of God is very plain,
isn't it? And so here we can see that sometimes, you see,
Satan is one who deludes us, deludes
us and pretends that our worship is satisfying to God, when the
reality is, it's an abomination. And the reason for that is, as
is spoken here, when I called, none did answer. When I spoke,
they did not hear, but they did evil before mine eyes, and chose
that in which I delighted not. The Word of God tells us to obey
is better than sacrifice. And it is so, so important that
in our spiritual life we hear the Word of God speaking to our
hearts. And we don't ignore it. We don't say, well, I've done
my duty, perhaps not outwardly, not loudly, but inwardly. You see, such a situation is
not acceptable with Almighty God. It never was, and it never
will be. And so we should be thankful
today that we have the Word of God, as it were, to speak to
our hearts and give us a wake-up call. We can very easily become
slumbering, in what we think is the true way of God. But the
truth is, we don't possess the favour of God. We don't possess
that which the Lord speaks to us. We turn a deaf ear. We turn a deaf ear. Well, you
have to answer before God, I have to answer before God. And is
it true of us today that when the Lord's called us, We haven't answered. We've heard
that call, but we've seen fit not to answer. No, we've ignored it. And we've gone away, really rebelling
against God. And when the Lord calls and when
he speaks, and sometimes It may have been we've read the Word
of God and God has spoken to us. Perhaps we've heard the preaching
of the Word and the Lord's spoken to us. And yet what's been the
effect? We chose that in which the Lord
delights not. And what is that? To ignore the
Word of God. Well, that's a very, very solemn
position, isn't it? And surely it's prevalent today.
As we look around, look around the churches, look around the
world, it's a prevalent position today. And those people, the
Lord does not look upon favourably, because they've turned their
back upon the Word of God. But we're thankful we have a
description to which we need to hone in on. to see whether
it's something that describes our spiritual condition. But
to this man, now may this be true of each one of us here,
to this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a
contrite spirit and trembleth at my word. Well, the Word of
God is full of encouragement to the seeker, to those who truly
desire to be favoured and to be blessed with union and communion
with Almighty God. And we read in the previous chapter,
57, in this same prophecy, what the Lord says. For thus saith
the High and Lofty One, that inhabiteth eternity, whose name
is Holy. I dwell in the High and Holy
Place." And then we have a wonderful word, with him, with the true
believer, with him. Also, that is of a contrite and
humble spirit. to revive the spirit of the humble
and to revive the heart of the contrite ones. So if we come
under the description of these words here, before us, who is
poor and contrite and trembling, and remember, this is somebody
who may appear to be depressed, and dejected and fearful and
afraid. These are those to whom the Lord
will come and meet with and revive. It's not someone who is proud
and satisfied with their outward performance of religion. It's some that have the blessed
work of the Spirit in their hearts. And what that does is to bring
us down in our own estimation. It's to bring us lower, lower. And the work of grace continues
to do that, to bring us lower in our own estimation. And as
we come down in our own estimation, Then it is that we plead. Then it is that we pray. Then
it is that we seek more earnestly for God's blessing, for His mercy,
for His favour toward us. Because the Spirit of God is
directing us to our utter failure, our utter unworthiness, the evil
of our hearts, the sinfulness of our nature, so that we don't
stand up proud. We fall down and acknowledge
our lowest state, naturally. And then it is, you see, that
the Lord Jesus Christ becomes a living reality. It's then He
becomes precious to us, because then it is that we see in Him
all that we need. We see how we failed. But we
see that in Him there is that blessed, wonderful favour to
be united to Him. And so we have this statement,
with Him also. The Lord will come with Him also,
who is like one of these people. Now then, it may take a lot to
bring you and me down from our high place. We may be sat on
our perch, looking all around, displaying the scenery. God will
bring us off that perch, so that we're down in a low place, but
seeking for God's blessing and seeking for God's eternal favour
toward us. Remember this, those are the
ones to whom the Lord will look. And perhaps we've been waiting
and we've been expecting God to come to us, and perhaps we
haven't recognised that we're not in a right condition for
God to bless us. We're not submitting ourselves
under the mighty hand of God. We may have thought we were,
but we may have drawn a wrong conclusion. And the Lord does
show us how weak we are and how poor we are. Not how good we
are and how wonderful we are at picking up all the problems
that exist in other people's lives and various situations. No. The Lord makes us look at
ourselves. Look at ourselves. And when we
see something of the truth of our own selves as God looks upon
us, not as man looks upon us, See, man only sees the outside
in a way that looks wonderfully prim and proper. But you see,
God looks at the inside. God looks at our heart. And He
sees what we're like, what we're like. You can sit in chapel all
day, and you can look wonderful. You can be dressed in all the
right gear and appear to be listening, and yet you can receive nothing
at all. You can just be occupied in your
own little way, in your own little thoughts. But my friends, it
may be the very opposite. You may be utterly bedraggled
and yet come with a real desire to hear what God the Lord will
speak to your souls because you're hungry and thirsty. Because you
come really with that position, give me Christ or else I die. Now that's the reality. And that's
a blessing of those who are found in this position, poor, contrite,
and trembling at God's Word. Well, we can bless God today.
You know, the psalmist also explains the position. And in the 34th
Psalm, the Lord speaks. He tells us this, 34th Psalm,
in the 18th verse, We read, the Lord is nigh unto them. Who is he going to speak about?
Who is he near to? Nigh unto them that are of a
broken heart, and saith such as be of a contrite spirit. Again, we have the very clear
picture, don't we? referred to again, to instruct
us to those who the Lord will look upon and the Lord will be
gracious to. He comes and tells us, many are
the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivereth him out
of them all. And the Lord brings us into those
positions, those positions which are to bring us down so that
we are no defeat of the Lord Jesus Christ. David understood
what the true sacrifices were and he describes it in that well-known
51st Psalm and this is how he describes it. The sacrifices
of God are a broken spirit and a contrite heart. See, that's
an acceptable sacrifice. A broken and a contrite heart.
Oh God, thou would not despise. We don't want God to despise
us, do we? And you know, we shall be despised if we have a wrong
attitude, if we have a proud look, a proud situation. But here, the Word of God describes
it so very clearly to us. a broken and a contrite heart,
O God thou would not despise." David had proved it. David knew
what it was to be brought right down low. And David was a blessed person,
a person who was wonderfully blessed of his God, but he had
to come right down. And sometimes, like it was in
David's case, The Lord allows us to fall into sin. It may not be just like David
with murder and adultery. I hope it's not. But it may be
in our hearts. The Lord brings those conditions
into our hearts that we realise, in actual fact, we're no better
than David. It may be in other ways. But
the Lord does come. And he allows us to do things,
perhaps physically, perhaps speak, perhaps think. And he brings
these things into our remembrance to humble us. So that we can't
think, well, I'm a pretty good Christian, and I wouldn't do
that, and I wouldn't say that, and I wouldn't think that. Well,
if you're allowed to develop such a situation, bless God if
he allows you then to realise how weak you are. Left to yourself,
left to ourselves, we are but weak sinners of the earth. No
man can keep alive his own soul. It means that you and I have
to be totally, totally dependent upon our God. The Lord Jesus,
in that Sermon on the Mount, he said, Blessed are the poor
in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of God. Again, naturally
we might think, well, I'm surprised at that. Well, you may be surprised
at it, but it's the Word of God. And it's the Word of God which
we need to hold on to. Blessed then are the poor in
spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of God. Well then, this morning,
here we have this statement to this man, when I look, even to
him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word."
Well, let us look in our own hearts this morning and try and
discern whether there is the evidence of that. The Lord has
brought us, brought us down, so that we may feel this morning
depressed because of our failure. Not something you'll want to
boast about, is it? But it's a wonderful thing if God has
brought you to recognise your failure. And that may be, therefore,
depressing to you. Well, be encouraged. Here is a statement. But to this
man, when I look. It's not someone who's lifted
up. and thinks what a good person they are, what a wonderful ability
they have to be able to say this and do that, the Lord won't allow
his people to be proud in their attainments. He will show them
that it's all of his grace. When the Lord then deals with
us and brings us down in our own estimation, we can then bless
God. for giving us grace, giving us
ability, giving us those things that we may have been able to
declare, not for our satisfaction and glory, but for the Lord's
honour and glory, and how essential that is in our spiritual life,
to recognise the truth of these things. The Lord will look then
upon someone who may feel to be depressed, because of their
situation, because of their failure, and what they are really? They
are poor in spirit. Poor in spirit. Blessed then
are the poor in spirit. Be encouraged this morning. My
friends, if you're riding on the crest of a wave and you're
so proud of what you've been doing and saying you need to
question the reality of your religion or Just beware, because
the Lord may bring you into a place where you will have to come down. Come down. Remember, little old
Zacchaeus, didn't he? He was up in the tree. He was
pretty proud, wasn't he? The Lord said, come down. Come
down. He had to come down, didn't he?
He had to come down. And when he came down, God came. and dwelt with him, went into
his house, and dined with him. What a blessing. My friend, you
and I have to come down. And so, poor, and then of a contrite
heart, well, dejected. Dejected. Contrite. Surely that means we're
sorry. Contrition is a good word, isn't
it? To be contrite, to be sorry, and that may make us then dejected. So you won't feel very bright,
will you? You won't feel, well, I'm in a great state now for
the Lord to come and bless me. But when you see the Lord brings
you down to a position where you're contrite and perhaps in
your own heart dejected, Then you can think, well, the Lord
has brought me here and now the Lord will come and look upon
me. And when the Lord looks upon
us, we look to him. And we see he's looking upon
us. And we observe himself. And there is then that drawing
to him because we know that Lord Jesus walked this way on this
earth, didn't he? You know, we have a wonderful
example of the Lord himself, who was poor and contrite in
this world, wasn't he? Yes, he didn't seek his own will. He didn't seek to do his own
will. He sought to do his father's
will and to obey the voice of his father, a contrite spirit,
and then to tremble, to tremble before God. Tremble before God. You see, naturally, perhaps some
of us don't tremble very much. But you see, when the work of
God is in our soul, we tremble before God. We tremble. We're
afraid that we've offended the Most High God. We may tremble
sometimes to think that we've offended God insofar that we
may have committed the unpardonable sin. That may make us tremble,
mightn't it? It should make us tremble. But
what a favour it is to realise the Lord has brought us there
to show us our ignorance and our rebellion perhaps against
his word and to feel and to know that in that position the Lord
looks upon us because he's accomplishing his great work in our soul. And
he's giving us that fearfulness, that fear of the Lord, which
is the beginning of wisdom, the beginning of eternal wisdom,
the fear of the Lord. And trembleth at my word. It's at the Lord's word. It's
what God speaks that we tremble, because we realise we haven't
walked in the right way. We haven't listened to his commands. We haven't enjoyed fellowship
with him. No, we've gone after our own
inclinations. And therefore, we've not perhaps
been reverent to our God. We haven't been reverent. And neither is, as we come into
the presence of God, to recognise that he is high and lifted up,
and holy and righteous, and to be truly reverent. As we come
to Him in prayer, now thankfully we know that we can come to God
in prayer any time, in any way, but may it be in a reverent way. Trembleth at my word. See, it all comes back to the
word of God, to the truth of God. and to be afraid that God
may judge us. He will judge us, but to not
be judged in a wrong way, but to know that the Lord Jesus Christ
has come and satisfied the judgment of God on our behalf because
he's paid the price for our sins. Now, all of these situations,
all of these statements, are to bring us, if we are the children
of God, closer to the Lord Jesus Christ. To make ourselves conformable
unto his image. That's not something that you
and I can develop ourselves, but it's something which the
Spirit of God does, to make us more like him, conformable unto
his image. And it's an infinite favour,
my friends, if you and I are blessed like that. Because as
the Prophet goes on and he says, hear the word of the Lord, ye
that tremble at his word. Ye that tremble at his word,
hear the voice of the Lord. And it's interesting in this
chapter that we read together, It speaks about those who travail
for Zion. That means they're in labour
for Zion, for the Church of God. They're labouring for the prosperity
of the Church of God. And we can believe, therefore,
that if the Spirit of God moves our heart to be like this, to
be poor and contrite and trembling, then we should be found labouring
for the blessing of God in favouring Zion, praying for one another,
praying for a gracious increase in those whom the Lord will call,
praying the Lord will do great things, and to be found labouring,
travailing. Well, is there much labour today? Is there much travail today?
We have a picture, don't we? We have a woman in travel bringing
forth a child. And well, we know it's a very,
very painful situation. And we know it's by far from
an easy situation. But it's that which is necessary
in order to bring forth a living child. Well, may we be able to
examine ourselves and see whether we are travailing, labouring
for the Church of God, or whether we are self-centred, whether
we are satisfied with just some apparent sacrifice. Well, my
friends, real religion is far deeper than that, isn't it? It
touches the heart and it makes us willing to be a true labourer,
to serve the Lord, day by day, hour by hour, and to see earnestly
for the blessing of God, the favour of God, and to see the
Kingdom of God being brought to pass in many a sinner's life. Well, this morning then, as we
have this description, it's a wonderful chapter, this last chapter in
Isaiah. Well, of course, the whole Bible is a wonderful book.
In some ways, there are certain scriptures which stand out, and
many of the scriptures in this chapter stand out, to encourage
us in our spiritual life, in the day in which we live. And
to be thankful today that the Word of God is never old-fashioned. It always describes the present
scene in our spiritual life. And so may we today recognise
we have a God who is so great, the heaven of heavens cannot
contain him. He is so mighty and powerful, he spoke the world
into being and yet this great God looks, looks upon those,
I look even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit and
trembleth at my word and may We each be found within the compass
of this statement and thank God for his love, for his mercy,
for his favour to us in bringing us to this position. Because
if he has, he reveals Christ. And my friends, if he reveals
Christ, that's a resting place, that's a place of peace, that's
a place of blessing. And we can go on our way rejoicing
to realise the Lord has been mindful of us. He will bless
us. Amen.