The Lord helping me this morning,
the scripture that I'll bring to your attention is found in
Isaiah 63 and verse 17. I thought I was going to be preaching,
to be honest, a different text, but I felt that the Lord would
have me preach from this scripture this morning. And so I bring
it to you, Isaiah 63 verse 17, O Lord, why hast thou made us
to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? Return
for thy servants' sake the tribes of thine inheritance. These are
the words of a prayer of the people of God, a prayer which
is or was, as it were, put into the mouth of the church in a
time of great distress and affliction. The prayer begins in verse 15. Look down from heaven and behold
from the habitation of thy holiness and of thy glory. And it concludes
at the end of the next chapter. Wilt thou refrain thyself for
these things, O Lord? Wilt thou hold thy peace and
afflict us very sore? It was clearly a time of great,
a time of terrible affliction. Our adversaries have trodden
down my sanctuary, we read in verse 18. And in the next chapter,
in verse 10, thy holy cities are a wilderness Zion is a wilderness,
Jerusalem a desolation our holy and our beautiful house where
our fathers praised thee is burned up with fire and all our pleasant
things are laid waste." It was a time of great affliction but
it was also a time of great conviction of sin Again, in the next chapter
at verse 6, we read, But we are all as an unclean thing, and
all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags, and we all do fade
as a leaf, and our iniquities like the wind have taken us away.
And there is none that calleth upon thy name, that stirreth
up himself to take hold of thee, for thou hast hid thy face from
us. and has consumed us because of our iniquities. Such were
God's dealings with this people at this time. They were greatly
afflicted and they were brought to a great conviction of sin. Because they had sinned against
the Most High God. They had sinned against their
God. who had dealt so bountifully
with them. Well, these words then, the words
of our text, are part of the prayer of the true people of
God. O Lord, why hast thou made us
to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? Return
for thy servants' sake the tribes of thine inheritance. And we
see that these words are indeed the words of the true people
of God from the preceding verse. Verse 16, doubtless, thou art
our father. Though Abraham be ignorant of
us, and Israel acknowledge us not, thou, O Lord, art our father,
our Redeemer. Thy name is from everlasting. In verse 19 we read, we are thine,
and so on, we are thine. in all their affliction, in all
their trials, the Lord's people are yet enabled by grace and
through faith to say, doubtless, thou art our Father, thou art
our Father, our Redeemer. Well these words then are the
words of the true people of God, and I emphasize this because
we're not to imagine that these are the words of the wicked These
are not the words of the profane amongst the people of God. You
see, the wicked, the profane, would lay the blame for their
sinfulness upon God, making Him the author of their sin. That's
not what is happening here. O Lord, why hast thou made us
to err from thy ways and hardened our hearts from thy fear? There
are those who do try to blame God for their sin and who seek
to excuse themselves and exonerate themselves. You've heard their
mantra, God made me this way. Or there are those who say, well
if this hadn't happened to me I wouldn't have done that. And
so they blame God's providence for their sin. No, these words
O LORD, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened
our heart from thy fear? These are the words not of the
wicked. These are the words of the true people of God. This
is true prayer. This is a sincere prayer of the
true people of God. Now, of course, it is true that
amongst the true people of God there are the false. amongst
the wheat grow the tares. In the gospel net there are some
bad fish caught with the good. You know the parables of our
Lord Jesus Christ in Matthew's gospel. We have the parable there
of the net. In Matthew 13, verse 47, again,
the kingdom of heaven is like unto a net that was cast into
a sea and gathered of every kind. which when it was full they drew
to shore, and sat down and gathered the good into vessels, but cast
the bad away. So shall it be at the end of
the world. The angels shall come forth and
sever the wicked from among the just." We are in the time state
at the moment, the judgment has not yet come, and there are the
wicked yet amongst the just. And it may well be that even
amongst the Lord's people there will be those who would make
God the author of their sin, just as there are those of the
world who would do so. They are those who walk after
their own ungodly lusts, as Jude says, sensual, having not the
spirit. To make God the author of our
sin is as old as Adam. and as old as his fall into sin. Remember how he said to God,
the woman whom thou gavest me, the woman whom thou gavest to
be with me, she gave me of the tree and I did eat. He's trying
to exonerate himself. It's not my fault, it's your
fault because you gave me the woman. He blames God for his sin and
so it has ever been since the fall of Adam. Well, looking at
the context, we see that the words of our text are not the
words of a false professor. We see that this is not the prayer
of the apostate or of the profane. This is a prayer which has been
inspired by the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God. And it is
the true prayer. of the true people of God. O
Lord, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened
our heart from thy fear? Return for thy servants' sake
the tribes of thine inheritance." Now at the outset we must briefly
note these three things. Firstly, that true believers
may for a time err from the ways of God, and true believers may
for a time have their hearts hardened, at least partially,
from the fear of the Lord. Secondly, that this awful condition,
that of erring from the ways of God and hardness of heart,
is brought by God himself. Thirdly, that in times of spiritual
judgments on the church, It behoves us to seek the Lord for mercy
and also to make inquiry with regards to God's dealings with
us, to make inquiry as to His purposes. O Lord, why hast Thou
made us to err from Thy ways and hardened our heart from Thy
fear? Return for Thy servant's sake
the tribes of Thine inheritance. Well, as we come to the words
of our text we should consider three things This morning I trust
with the Lord's gracious help and blessing. Firstly, what it
means to err from the ways of God. Secondly, what is this hardening
of the heart? And then thirdly, why does God
thus deal with his own chosen and redeemed people? O Lord,
why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened our
heart from thy fear? Return for thy servants' sake
the tribes of thine inheritance. Well, let us consider then firstly
what it means to err from the ways of God. O Lord, why hast
thou made us to err from thy ways? What are the ways of God? Well, the ways of God are either
God's ways towards us, or our ways towards God. God's way towards
us are the ways of his providence, his providential dealings with
us. We may be said to err from God's providential ways when
we fail to see, or fail to recognize, or even fail to acknowledge the
Lord's hand in all our circumstances. The language of faith is this,
the fictitious power of chance and fortune I defy. My life's
minutest circumstance is subject to his eye. We greatly err from
God's ways when we fail to see or acknowledge that my life's
minutest circumstance is subject to his eye. We may be said to
err from the ways of God when we are unthankful for all his
goodness to us in providence or in grace, and we requite him
with evil for the good that he has done to us. So it was with
Israel of old. In verse 7 we read, I will mention
the lovingkindnesses of the Lord and the praises of the Lord,
according to all that the Lord hath bestowed upon us, and the
great goodness toward the house of Israel, which he hath bestowed
on them according to his mercies, and according to the multitude
of his lovingkindnesses. That's what we read in verse
7, but then in verse 10 we read, But they rebelled, and vexed
his Holy Spirit. Therefore he was turned to be
their enemy, and he fought against them. Oh, they were an ungrateful
people! This is to err from God's ways,
his gracious ways, towards us. But surely, what is principally
intended here in the words of our text is this, our ways towards
God, or our obedience. We err from the ways of God when
we do not walk in the way that he has prescribed for us in his
word. Again, this was the case with
the Jews of old. Jeremiah 6 verse 16, Thus saith
the Lord, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old
paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall
find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk
therein. Verse 19 of that chapter, Here,
O earth, behold, I will bring evil upon these people, even
the fruit of their thoughts, because they have not hearkened
unto my words, nor to my law, but rejected it." To reject the authority of the
Word of God, to walk in disobedience to its precepts, is to err from
the ways of God. the church may err from the ways
of God by introducing innovations into public worship, such as
drama, music bands, videos, and other forms of idolatry, or by
neglecting or laying aside those things which the Lord has ordained
for his worship, such as preaching, the reading of the scriptures,
prayer, singing, the ordinances of baptism and the Lord's Supper,
the ceasing of corporate worship altogether on the Lord's Day,
for whatever reason. Where there is any of these things
in the Church, there is surely an erring from the ways of God. And likewise, when men begin
to wear head coverings or hats in the service of worship, and
the women discard their head coverings, when women begin to
teach and to lead in prayer, and the men are silent, Surely
this is to err from the ways of God because all these things
are so contrary to the New Testament Scriptures. And what of the bringing
in of modern versions of the Scriptures based on corrupted
manuscripts? We could go on. And there is surely an erring
from the ways of God when we do not pay that debt of love
which we owe to the Lord's people. when we do not endeavor to keep
the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace, when we do not
obey them that have the rule over us, when we forsake the
assembling of ourselves together, a church may err from the ways
of God, and so can an individual believer. The individual believer
may err from the ways of God in the church, and he or she may err from the
ways of God in the home. the wife who will not submit
to her husband, the husband who does not love and cherish his
wife, the disobedient child, the father who provokes his children
to wrath and who does not bring them up in the nurture and admonition
of the Lord. We may err from the ways of God
in our work or in our business, not obeying our masters according
to the flesh, our employers. not paying or withholding payment
from those who do work for us, defrauding our neighbor, and
so on. We may err from the ways of God as citizens of the state
or as the Queen's subjects if we do not render, therefore,
to all their dues tribute to whom tribute is due, custom to
whom custom, fear to whom fear, honor to whom honor. Indeed,
We are to be subject to the higher powers, but only up to a certain
point. If the powers that be advise
us, or compel us, to disobey God, then we must say with the
apostles, we ought to obey God rather than men. Anything else,
compliance to the state in disobedience to God, will be to make the state
our ultimate authority. It is to make Caesar a god. It
is to put Caesar in the place of God. As Francis Schaeffer
once said, the bottom line is that at a certain point there
is not only the right but the duty to disobey the state. Our forebears in the faith, the
non-conforming Protestant dissenters of our own nation, have left
us very fine examples of this duty of disobeying the state,
as did those Christians who suffered for their faith under the Communists
in the Soviet Union. Compliance to the state in disobedience
to God is an erring from the ways of God. Now we could say
much more on this subject, But just to summarize, to err from
the ways of God really has to do with our outward walk, our
obedience, or otherwise, to the precepts of the Word of God. O Lord, why hast thou made us
to err from thy ways, those ways which thou hast marked out for
us in thy Holy Word? Well, having considered in the
first place what it means to err from the ways of God, let us
consider in the second place What is this hardening of the
heart? O Lord, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways,
and hardened our heart from thy fear? Now here we proceed from
the outward to the inward. The cause of all our acts of
disobedience, the cause of all our wanderings and backslidings
and declining from the ways of God and from the word of God
is the hardening of our heart. The cause of our erring from
the ways of God is the hardening of our heart from the fear of
God. O Lord, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways and hardened
our heart from thy fear? At the very least the two go
together. The erring from God's ways and the hardening of the
heart. The inward and the outward. O Lord, why hast thou made us
to err from thy ways and harden our heart from thy fear. The
erring from the ways of God is surely an evidence of the hardening
of the heart. The hardening of the heart will
be made manifest in an erring from the ways of God. So what
is this hardening of the heart? Well there are two types of hardening
of the heart, there is that total, complete hardening and there
is a partial hardening. A total or complete hardening
is that that is to be seen in the reprobate. A partial hardening
of the heart may be the experience even of the very elect of God
from time to time. And it is this latter type that
is spoken of here in the words of our text as we shall see. Those whose hearts are totally
hardened from the fear of the Lord will not humble themselves
to seek after God. They may be Jew, they may be
Gentile. We have a Gentile example in
the person of Pharaoh, king of Egypt. Romans 9, verse 17, Paul
says, For the Scriptures saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same
purpose have I raised thee up, that I might show my power in
thee. and that my name might be declared
throughout all the earth therefore hath he mercy on whom he will
have mercy and whom he will he hardeneth and many times in the
history that we have in the book of Exodus we read that the Lord
hardened Pharaoh's heart and that hardening of his heart and
the hearts of the Egyptians eventually led to their utter destruction
in the Red Sea There's also the example of the
Jews in the time of Christ who rejected him. Back in Isaiah chapter 6 verse
9 we read and he said go and tell this people hear ye indeed
but understand not and see ye indeed, but perceive not. Make
the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and
shut their eyes, lest they see with their eyes, and hear with
their hearts, and understand with their hearts, and convert
and be healed. Now the Lord Jesus Christ quoted
that scripture when he was asked why he preached to them in parables. And what was the end of that
nation? which believed not on him. Isaiah continues, Then said
I, Lord, how long? And he answered, Until the cities
be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and
the land be utterly desolate, and the Lord have removed men
far away, and there be a great forsaking in the midst of the
land. And this was fulfilled in A.D. 70. There was the utter
destruction of the Jewish nation, and their temple, and their priesthood,
just as their have been previously a total destruction of Pharaoh
and his armies in the Red Sea. This total or complete hardening
of the heart from the fear of God is a judgment, a spiritual
judgment upon men, and like other judgments from the Lord, it is
a judgment which can be seen. And we do see it, we see it today
in the case of those whom God has given up to unclean lusts. Romans 1 verse 24, wherefore
God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lust of their own
hearts to dishonor their own bodies between themselves and
verse 28 of that chapter God gave them over to a reprobate
mind to do those things which are not convenient when the Lord
removes from men all fear, all shame, and all restraint so that
they run after the sinful dictates of their evil hearts and they
delight in their sin and have pride in their sin and do we
not see that their hearts are hardened from the fear of God When the devil blinds the minds
of them which believe not, when men believe the lies of the devil
and reject the truth of God, there is surely a hardening of
the heart from the fear of God. We may be living now in a secular
state as we're continually being told and reminded. But you know, the secularists
still have their prophets. Charles Darwin, the father of
the modern scientific lie. The climatologists, with all
their false predictions of global warming and so on. Neil Ferguson,
with all his false predictions regarding bird flu, mad cow disease,
swine flu, and the latest of course, Covid-19. O Timothy, keep that which is
committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings and
oppositions of science falsely so called, which some professing
have erred concerning the faith. Grace be with thee. Amen. to listen to the lies of the
modern false prophets, to listen to the lies of the BBC, Beelzebubs,
Broadcasting Corporation and other fake news mainstream media,
rather than hearkening to the Word of God, is surely an evidence
of a hardening of the heart from the fear of God. And for this cause God shall
send them strong delusion that they should believe a lie, that
they all might be damned to believe not the truth, but have pleasure
in unrighteousness. Oh, what a mercy it is to be
brought to embrace the truth of God and to turn away from
all the lies of the devil. So Paul continues there, doesn't
he, in 2 Thessalonians chapter 2, but we are bound to give thanks
always to God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord, because
God has from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification
of the Spirit and belief of the truth. Belief of the truth! Oh, what a mercy it is to have
a heart softened by divine grace! The Lord speaks by the prophet
Ezekiel. Ezekiel 11 verse 19. And I will
give them one heart and I will put a new spirit within you and
I will take the stony heart out of their flesh and will give
them a heart of flesh that they may walk in my statutes and keep
my ordinances and do them and they shall be my people and I
will be their God. And then he goes on to say, to
speak of the reprobate whose hearts are hardened. But as for
them, whose heart walketh after the heart of their detestable
things and their abominations, I will recompense their way upon
their own heads, saith the Lord God. There is that total hardening
of the hearts of the reprobate. But we said earlier that the
words of our text really are speaking of a partial hardening
of the heart because these words are the words of the true people
of God. Oh Lord, why hast thou made us
to err from thy ways and hardened our hearts from thy fear? It
is possible for the heart of a true Christian to be hardened
from the fear of the Lord We see that in the words of our
text, don't we? O Lord, why hast thou made us
to err from thy ways and harmed our heart from thy fear? Now,
what are the symptoms of this spiritual disorder, this disorder
of the soul? Well, there may be a lack of
a sense of sin. There may be a lack of a sense
of sin when it comes to secret sins, when corrupt desires arise
in the heart and there is not that pricking of the conscience,
no disturbance of peace. Then that is surely symptomatic
of a hardening of the heart from the fear of the Lord. The psalmist
says In Psalm 19, who can understand
his errors? Cleanse thou me from secret thoughts. Keep back thy servant also from
presumptuous sins. Let them not have dominion over
me. Then shall I be upright, and I shall be innocent from
the great transgression. Let the words of my mouth and
the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord,
my strength and my Redeemer. Every thought must be brought
into captivity to the obedience of Christ. The fear of the Lord
in our hearts will make us very sensible of the inward workings
of the flesh, and the fear of the Lord in our hearts will make
us very sensible of the outward workings of the flesh too. And where there is a hardening
of our heart from the fear of the Lord, there will be a corresponding
lack of a sense of sin when it comes to our outward walk. We
are called to walk circumspectly, not as fools. We are to walk
to please God. We are to glorify God in our
body and in our spirit, which are God's. when we cease to do
so, when we fail to do so and there is no felt sense of sin
is that not a sure symptom of a hardening of the heart from
the fear of the Lord where there is a falling short of the glory
of God and yet no contrition of heart it can only be because
there is a hardening of the heart from the fear of the Lord where
sin is thought of so lightly. Well, there must be a hardening
of the heart when we think of the price of our redemption,
the cost of our forgiveness, the precious blood of the Lamb
of God, Jesus was slain that our sins might be forgiven, we
are washed from our sins in the blood of Christ. Oh, how hard
must that heart be that can sin so lightly against the Saviour's
blood But you know there may be a lack
of a sense of the sin of others as well as of ourselves. Where
there is a complete indifference as to whether someone else sins
or not or where there is a laughing at the sins of others there must
surely be a hardening of the heart. Where is the zeal for
the glory of God and the concern for the souls of men? The psalmist
whose heart was softened by divine grace cried out, Rivers of waters
run down mine eyes, because they keep not thy law. When we begin to lose that sense
of sin, it is a great evidence that our hearts are being partially
hardened. from the fear of the Lord but
you know there is something else that is a great evidence of a
hardening of the heart from the fear of the Lord and that is
when we begin to fear other things when we begin to have other fears and that fear these other fears
begin to lead us away from the ways of God when we fear the
authorities when we fear Caesar more than
God Jesus said and he still says
and fear not them which kill the body but are not
able to kill the soul but rather fear him which is able to destroy
both soul and body in hell when our hearts are softened by the
grace of the Lord our God and the Lord is our fear oh then
we shall be able to say with the psalmist the Lord is on my
side I will not fear what can man do unto me? when we fear a virus more than
God then surely our hearts are hardened from the fear of the
Lord Again the words of the psalmist in Psalm 91 apply to one who
fears God. Thou shalt not be afraid of the
terror by night, nor for the arrow that flyeth by day, nor
for the pestilence that walketh in darkness. If we will not entertain our
own friends and family, the stranger has no hope, has he? And yet
the word of God says, let brotherly love continue. Be not forgetful
to entertain strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels
unawares. When we treat one another as
walking biohazards, and we will not even shake hands, even though
the word of God tells us that we are to greet one another with
a holy kiss. Or when we see all these things
in the church, Is it not an evidence of a hardening of the heart from
the fear of the Lord? Well thirdly and finally let
us ask the question why does God thus deal with his own chosen
and redeemed people? As we've said it is the Lord
our God who does sometimes bring his people into this miserable
and deplorable condition O Lord, why hast thou made us to err
from thy ways, and hardened our hearts from thy fear? Well, I
would suggest briefly three reasons as to why the Lord would thus
deal with his people. Firstly, unthankfulness for former
mercies. This was the case with the church
here in Isaiah 63. Verse 8, For he said, Surely
they are my people, children that will not lie. So he was
their Saviour. In all their affliction he was
afflicted. And the angel of his presence saved them. In his love
and in his pity he redeemed them. And he bared them and carried
them all the days of old. But they rebelled and vexed his
Holy Spirit. Therefore he was turned to be
their enemy, and he fought against them. Oh, the Lord will chasten
his sons, should they become so ungrateful and forgetful of
all his benefits as to rebel against him. Secondly, covetousness. The Lord would chasten his sons
for their covetousness. Covetousness is a form of idolatry. And idolatry is something that
God hates. Remember how Paul speaks of covetousness
in Colossians. Covetousness which is idolatry. The Lord our God will have no
rivals. He will have no rivals. My son,
give me thine heart and let thine eyes observe my ways. Again we
see that the church in Isaiah's day was chastened for their covetousness. Isaiah 57 verse 17. For the iniquity of his covetousness
was I wroth, and smote him. I hid me and was wroth, and he
went on fraudly in the way of his heart. And thirdly, the Lord would awaken
us and quicken us by thus dealing with us. Now the question is,
are we awake yet? Are you awake? Are you awake? John Owen said, if there be anything
of true grace in our hearts, a sense of spiritual judgments
will awaken us, when all outward judgments in the world will not
do it. No, if thunder and lightning be round about us, if ruin and
the sword be before us, and the earth underneath be ready to
swallow us up, they will not work so kindly upon a believer's
heart as a sense of spiritual judgment. Have these spiritual judgments
woken you up yet? Has it woken me up? We must ask
the question of ourselves. We must make inquiry. Was it not the case here with
the church in our text this morning? Surely they had been awakened. They were convinced of their
sin and they saw that this spiritual judgment had come upon them And
so they begin to call upon the name of the Lord. O Lord, why
hast thou made us to err from thy ways and hardened our hearts
from thy fear? And they cry to the Lord to return
to them in a way of grace and mercy. Return for thy servants'
sake, the tribes of thine inheritance. Now in conclusion, how may we
recover ourselves from this awful condition? Well the answer is
by prayer. Return for thy servant's sake
the tribes of thine inheritance. Oh see how the church here prays. And like the church here in this
chapter. we can plead the sovereign mercy
and compassion of our God. Verse 15. Look down from heaven
and behold from the habitation of thy holiness and of thy glory.
Where is thy zeal and thy strength, the sounding of thy bowels and
of thy mercies toward me? Are they restrained? many times we are told in the
scriptures that the Lord is gracious and full of compassion that he
is a God full of compassion and gracious long-suffering and plenteous
in mercy and truth and we can plead that sovereign mercy and
compassion we can also plead the covenant faithfulness of
our God verse 16 Doubtless, thou art our Father, though Abraham
be ignorant of us, and Israel acknowledge us not. Thou, O Lord,
art our Father, our Redeemer, thy name is from everlasting. Though we are sinners of the
Gentiles by nature, yet we address thee as our Father which art
in heaven, as Christ has taught us. We are those of the Gentiles
whom thou hast redeemed by the blood of thine only begotten
Son. Thou hast begotten us again unto
a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. We plead covenant love, covenant
blood, and covenant promises. Sovereign mercy and covenant
faithfulness are all our plea before the throne of grace. And
it is there, it is there at the throne of grace that we may obtain
mercy and find grace to help in time of need. Such a time
of need as this is. May the Lord seal the truth of
his word to each of our hearts by his Holy Spirit. O Lord, Why hast thou made us
to err from thy ways, And hardened our hearts from thy fear? Return for thy servant's sake
The triumphs of thine inheritance. Amen.