Seeking for the help of the Lord,
I direct your prayerful attention to Isaiah chapter 25. It is the
chapter that we read, and reading from our text, verse 6. Isaiah chapter 25 and verse 6. And in this mountain shall the
Lord of hosts make unto all people a feast of fat things, a feast
of wines on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of wines
on the lees, well refined. Isaiah 25 and verse 6. Isaiah prophesying partly in
the days of Hezekiah, And we would remember that with Hezekiah
it was the time that the Assyrians came and they took away the ten
tribes and scattered them and they then fought against Judah
and sought to destroy it and take them away as well. But God
wonderfully delivered them, appeared for them and helped them and
Sennacherib had to go in shame back to his own country, his
army destroyed, and the Lord was with Judah and brought forth,
eventually, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, to that tribe and
in that place. The mountain spoken of, literally,
Mount Moriah, the Temple Mount, the mount where David was blessed
on the threshing floor of Rona, the Jebusite. The Lord showed
him where the temple was to be built. And before that, Abraham
offered up Isaac and had the Lord wonderfully provide the
substitute lamb and blessed him there with the covenant. The mountains round about Jerusalem,
but this mount was what beautifully set forth our Lord Jesus Christ,
the type of the temple. Our Lord, when he came, said,
destroy this temple, and in three days I'll raise it up again. But he spake of the temple of
his body. But that is looking at a very
broad brush and wide view, because before our Lord would come to
this mountain, to Jerusalem, and to his temple, the original
temple was to be destroyed. Even though Assyria did not take
away Judah, yet Babylon, when they came some 130 or so years
later, were to take them away. They were to go into Babylon
for 70 years, the temple would be destroyed, but they were to
be brought back again. And so these prophecies Though
they are speaking, and this our text is speaking of gospel days,
it is speaking of what the Lord Jesus Christ would do. In verse
8, very clearly, He will swallow up death in victory, and the
Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces. The rebuke of
His people shall be taken away from off all the earth, for the
Lord hath spoken in. He's speaking of the day when
the Lord shall come. It shall be said in that day,
lo, this is our God. We have waited for him and he
will save us. This is the Lord. We have waited
for him. We will be glad and rejoice in
his salvation. It is speaking of the salvation
of the Lord, what he would accomplish at Jerusalem. But these people
here, They not only needed those promises and expectation of the
coming Messiah, they needed those promises and helps for what they
would be going through themselves. And especially in the light of
the time that the temple should be destroyed, Jeremiah's time,
they needed that expectation. that though they were taken away
from their land for a period of time, they would be brought
back, they would be blessed again, the Lord had not forsaken them,
he would help them. Now this echoes very much for
the people of God in all days, in all time. The Apostle Paul,
he knew of the coming of the Lord. The Lord was his God, his
saviour, he trusted in him. But in the trials that he came
into in his own life, he needed those helps for those trials. The Lord said to him, my grace
is sufficient for thee, my strength is made perfect in weakness. And you and I will need those
promises, not just of heaven, all the blessings in our Lord
Jesus Christ, but those assurances of the Lord's presence with us,
and help and grace in the trials and things that come into our
lives. And the Old Testament church,
they had that. All the things that they walked
through, all that Abraham walked through, Isaac and Jacob, Moses,
the children of Israel, and all the way through the wilderness,
all their times in the promised land in captivity that they had,
they needed these assurances and helps, that the Lord was
with them and would help them and bring them safely through.
And over all this, they were looking to that time, that the
Saviour would come, the seed of the woman, to bruise the serpent's
head, and that He would truly come. And we know in these gospel
days, He has come. and we have set before us the
complete Word of God and the whole counsel of God is set before
us. And so we have before us not
the looking forward through a glass darkly as it was with Isaiah,
but looking back to Isaiah's prophecy and to see clearly,
even more clearly, what the Gospel provision is and what the Lord
will be doing and is doing in the gospel day. And it is in that way I want
to look at the word before us, and three points. Firstly, in
this mountain, the place that the Lord shall do these things.
In this mountain. And then secondly, what the Lord
shall make there. In this mountain shall the Lord
of hosts make unto all people a feast of fat things, a feast
of wines on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of wines
on the lees well refined. And then I want to speak of partaking
of that feast. If a feast is made, then it needs
to have those that partake of it. They don't just hear about
it, they don't just see it, but they partake of it. So I want
to speak of that in our third point. Firstly, in this mountain,
the Holy Scriptures clearly point to the place and where the Lord
of Hosts would work His salvation. We think of the wise men, the
kings that came to see our Lord when He was a babe, and they
came first to Jerusalem, They had an expectation, no doubt
based upon texts and passages like this, that this is where
they would expect to find the king of the Jews. But, of course,
at that time he was born at Bethlehem, and that is where the scriptures
also pointed that he should be at that time. But when it came
to be the time that he should offer himself up, that time that
he should do what he came to do, as he said to Pilate, for
this cause came I into the world to bear witness of the truth,
to lay down his life, a ransom, then it must be fulfilled, that
a prophet could not perish outside of Jerusalem. The scriptures
made it very clear that it should be there, that the offering should
be made. There was the temple type, there
was the anti-type to be made. And so we have a very clear point
here. Those who look for salvation,
those who look for the Lord's provision, They look where the
source of it is and where the Lord should make it, where he
should swallow up death in victory, where he should make this feast
of things, and it points to Jerusalem. We are told that there shall
flow waters, waters from Jerusalem, half to the former sea and half
to the hinder sea, half to the Gentiles, half to the Jews, And
so we have as well in our text here, that in this mountain shall
the Lord of hosts make unto all people a feast, not just the
Jews, but Jew and Gentile as well. So again, we are tracing
back to the source. And our Lord, when he sent forth
his disciples to preach, he said, tarry at Jerusalem. until ye
be endued with power from on high. And again, the emphasis
is that it is from Jerusalem, from this mountain, from this
place, that the good news of salvation is to go forth into
all the world. The blessing is to flow forth
from there. Just imagine if we were told
that it came from another place, from another source. and we were
to search the scriptures and we would come across verses like
this, we would say that does not add up, that is not where
it was pointed to in the scriptures, that is not the expectation. But we can compare the New Testament,
we can compare where Christ suffered, where he sent forth his disciples,
and where the expectation was in texts like this one in Isaiah,
and we can see that they agree. And this then is the historic
gospel. It is that of which God reveals
the plan of his salvation and how he shall accomplish those
blessings and where they shall flow forth from. So that is in
the first place. We would look at this mountain
as being Jerusalem. That is most definitely what
is pointed here. But then we could look at this
in a secondary way as to be the Church of God, as in Mount Zion. We know that the Lord has ordained
that there are to be churches, local churches throughout all
the world. We have the apostles going first
into the synagogues and preaching the Lord Jesus Christ Then we
have them going back to the churches that they'd established, those
that had order, those that were willingly giving themselves to
each other and the Lord, organized into a church order after the
order of the scriptures, with pastors and elders and deacons,
and with the ordinances of baptism and the Lord's Supper, and with
the discipline of the church. All it makes up a church. biblically based, based upon
the scriptures. And we have that type set forth
in the Revelation, where we have in the type of the seven churches
of Asia, we have the Lord in the midst of those seven golden
candlesticks representing those churches, and the Lord holding
in his hand the seven stars, which are the pastors of those
churches. And the word going forth to those
churches, and at the end of each of those letters, he that hath
an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches. So it is, in our day, we have,
yes, we trace it back to Jerusalem, but then we have that expectation
that this provision And this blessing is to come from the
Church of God. God, in his wisdom, has caused
that man, by his own wisdom, cannot find out God. He can do
many wonderful things. He can send men to the moon. He can make many wonderful inventions. But God has ordained that he
cannot find out God. He cannot understand by his natural
reason and ability the things of God. They are spiritually
discerned, it is the mystery of godliness, God manifests in
the flesh, and it must be revealed. And how it is revealed, it hath
pleased God through the foolishness of preaching, to save them that
believe. And so God uses that way to convey
the blessings that are spoken of here, the blessings that flow
forth from Calvary, from Jerusalem, they flow forth through the church
to the people in every nation and kindred and tongue. And it's
good for us to see where God has chosen to put the source
and where we are to look and expect the blessing of the Lord. We think even of the first day
of the week, When our Lord rose from the dead and appeared to
his disciples, sanctifying that day as being a new day of rest
for his people and a day when he would appear to them. Now,
of course, Thomas was not with the disciples when the Lord first
met, but he had to wait another eight days, wait until the next
first day of the week. before the Lord met with them.
And being together, being met together, that is where they
receive the visits of the Lord, the blessing of the Lord. John, he says in Revelation,
was in the Spirit on the Lord's day. And so it is a blessed thing
to realise the warrant of Scripture, the Lord's approbation and blessing,
that the blessings of the Gospel are to flow forth through the
Church of God, through the ministry of the Gospel, and it is to be
in the gathering of the people of God, though it is a privilege
to meet in the week as we do this evening, yet especially
on the Lord's Day. So our first point is highlighting
the source of the place in this mountain, firstly Jerusalem and
then Zion, the Church of the Living God, where the Lord shall
make this feast. I want to look then secondly
at what the Lord shall make there. We have a description here, shall
make unto all people a feast of fat things, a feast of wines
on the leaves, of fat things full of marrow, of wines on the
lees well refined. So as we have said, this is to
be for all people, that is every nation, kindred and tongue, Jew
and Gentile as well. And there's this picture of a
wonderful feast, a great feast that the Lord shall make. Now, just to think of some of
the examples here, this is an illustration, an example that
the Lord has set before us, a feast of fat things. In the sacrifices
of the Old Testament, the fat was always counted as the best,
and that was reserved for the Lord. The people could not eat
or have of the fat, that was the Lord's portion. So that is
the very best. And those in Isaiah's day, they
would have realized this, this up to this time, was never our
portion, this was the best, this was the Lord's portion. And then
we have a feast of wines, and it's not just wines, but wines
on the leaves, and fat things full of marrow, and again, it's
fatness. Now, I understand with the wine,
what are the leaves, and what, where do they come from, what
is it? Well, as the yeast is added to the wine, it starts
to ferment, it converts that sugar into alcohol and carbon
dioxide and as it mixes with that grape juice, eventually
when the yeast has consumed all of the sugar in the wine, then
it drops to the bottom in the fermentation vessel. And so there's
that wet, dense pile of residual mass that is called the gross
leaves, and it's a mixture of that dead yeast, grape skins,
seeds, stems, things that is then eventually racked off and
discarded. And the longer the wine ages
on its leaves with that sediment, as it were, in the bottom, the
more body and more dimensions it has. It's a better wine. It's the best wine that stays
longer on its leaves before they are taken off. So that is the
picture here. This is the best wine that is
being provided in this way. And this is what the Lord's picture
is, that he shall make unto all people this feast. of these fat,
these best things. Now, as we interpret it further,
when we look at the verses that follow, we look at our Lord destroying
in this mountain the face of the covering cast over all people. It shall be clearly seen, of
course this was reserved for the day of Pentecost, when the
Spirit fell, And when the disciples then were so clear as to the
Lord's purpose, even when the Lord ascended up into heaven,
they were still saying, will thou at this time restore the
kingdom unto Israel? And when the Spirit fell, then
it was very clear, the gospel day and the blessings that flow
forth through the death and resurrection of our Lord and Saviour Jesus
Christ. So Peter, he says to the people,
him whom ye have crucified and slain by wicked hands hath God
raised. He that was delivered by the
determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God. And Peter is able to
see clearly a plan of God, a purpose of God that has been brought
to light The sacrificial Passover lamb has been offered. The Lord
Jesus Christ, His blood has been shed. The provision has been
made. The seed of the woman that has
bruised the serpent's head has come. Dear Job, who said, I know
that my Redeemer liveth and that shall stand at the latter day
upon the earth. Those dear disciples knew that
this was the Redeemer. that type in the Old Testament
of the near kinsman, a redeemer, is fulfilled in our Lord Jesus
Christ, made like unto his brethren, sin accepted, made under the
law, made of a woman to redeem them that are under the law.
These things were all done in Jerusalem, and it is the feast
what our Lord said, except ye eat the flesh and drink the blood
of the Son of Man, ye have no life in you. And it is the feast
of really a full realisation of the fulfilling of all the
types and shadows in the Lord Jesus Christ and Him putting
away sin by the sacrifice of Himself and fulfilling, as was
said again and again at the crucifixion, that it might be fulfilled which
was written in the Scriptures. And like these verses here. And these things are to be, these
truths, are to be the meat and drink of the people of God, okay? And so what our Lord says in
John 6, except ye eat the flesh, and drink the blood of the Son
of Man, you have no life in you. In this provision, in what the
Lord accomplished at Calvary, He is providing this feast, this
provision. I, if I be lifted up above the
earth, will draw all men unto me. This, this is this provision
of the Lord. We have it, of course, set forth
in the Lord's Supper, You do so forth, the Lord's death till
he come. In the broken bread, in the wine,
we have the death of our Lord, his blood shed, his broken body. The church is never to forget
this. This is their provision, not
as the Jews thought, as the Lord taught it. They said, how can
this man give us his flesh to eat? They're offended. They walked
back, went no more with him. They didn't understand it in
a spiritual way. What is foretold here, this Feast
of Fat Things, is a spiritual feast. It is a feast of what
the Lord Jesus Christ did at Calvary. What he accomplished
there. This is the Feast of Fat Things. Like with the children of Israel,
they ate of the Passover. They ate it with haste. They
ate it with their shoes on their feet, their staff in their hand. And it was the time that they
were delivered and brought out by a high hand out of Egypt. Now, it's spoken of here as a
feast that is made and prepared by the Lord. The Lord has made
that feast. And when we think of the wines
on the lees, that which is really settled, that which the long
word is settled on that, the greater the fullness. When the
Church of God begins to preach, it has all of the Old Testament. You think in one sense, those
wines on the lees, they have been fermented right through
the ages, right through till it comes that the Lord has suffered,
bled and died, the Holy Spirit is given, and it's like then
those dregs are poured off, and the wine is pure, but it is rich,
and it's rich in all the richness of the Old Testament types and
shadows and what we have here, which is then very much emphasized
by the way our Lord dealt with it, with the two on the way to
Emmaus. He met with them on that Emmaus
road, and he, in all the scriptures, opened unto them the things concerning
himself. Ought not Christ to have suffered
these things and to enter into his glory? And they had a feast,
a spiritual feast. Their heart burned in them while
the Lord taught with them by the way. It was a spiritual feast. So did the eunuch, as Philip
came to him as he read in this very prophecy, Isaiah 53, concerning
the sufferings of our Lord, led as a lamb to the slaughter, as
a sheep before her shearers as dove. So he opened not his mouth. And Philip, he began at the same
scripture, and preached unto him Jesus. And through that sermon
the unit was brought to know that this was not the prophet
that was writing these things. It was some other man, but that
some other man was the Lord Jesus Christ. Knowing that one chapter
that he couldn't understand is brought from that ignorance to
believe, to understand, and to want to be baptised. A wonderful
blessing on that one sermon. If thou believest with all thy
heart thou must, I believe that Jesus is the Son of God. Beautiful testimony. But our
Lord, in ordering these things in the early church, the New
Testament, Himself, His own preaching, Philip's preaching, the Apostles'
preaching, it sets a seal on all of the rich provision of
the Old Testament that we preach the Lord Jesus Christ as fulfilling
these things. And the richness comes from that
depth and from how long those truths, as it were, have fermented
over the ages until they are poured out upon the Church of
God. And so the Lord there at Calvary
has made that feast. We are told very clearly what
the people of God are to feed upon. We were right back in Deuteronomy. All that the Lord did for the
children of Israel through those 40 years that God might make
thee to know that man doth not live by bread alone but by every
word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. And our Lord answered
Satan in his temptations, when Satan would tempt our Lord to
command these stones that they be made bread. He said, man shall
not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth
out of the mouth of God. This is the feast of fat things. This is the feast of wines on
the lees, the fat, things full of marrow, of wines on the leaves
well refined. This is what the feast is here. In one sense, what we've spoken
of here is a feast. And we know there's a great difference
between what we have in our daily food and what we might have in
a wedding feast or a special meal. And the children of Israel,
when they went through the wilderness, the Lord withheld not the manna
from their mouths. They had it every day apart from
this. And they, fresh on the ground,
and they lived on that manna. But very often they despised
it. They despised the manor. But
without that, they wouldn't have lived. But they did have special
times. They had the times when the tree
was cast into the bitter waters. They had the times when the rock
was struck and the waters flowed forth. They had times of great
miracles and wonders. But it wasn't every day. It wasn't
everything they had such a feast. We think of the lives of Jacob
and the time that he slept with the stones for his pillow, and
the Lord blessed him there, the ladder set up upon earth and
extending into heaven, the time of our Lord Jesus Christ, the
angels ascending and descending upon it, and we have the Lord
blessing him there. And it was to Bethel, the house
of God. And then he was blessed as well
at Mahanaim. He was blessed before he went
into the land of Canaan. But Jacob lived for over 100
years, 137 or so years. And yet you could perhaps count
on just a bit more than one hand the great blessings that he had. Did he have nothing to feed on
spiritually, no blessings? In the meantime, yes, he did.
And many of the Lord's dear people, they may have one or two times
that they speak of in their life that have been so richly blessed.
The Lord's wonderful opened up to them the scriptures that had,
like the eunuch did, they have been truly to feast upon the
things of God. especially when it's first opened
to them, they've first seen it and that covering is taken away
that is spread over them, they first see it with newly opened
eyes, the Gospel and the provision and the secret of the Lord, which
is with them that fear Him. When the Lord does that, those
are very special times for the people of God. But then they
live day by day and week by week, they still feed upon these truths. But in one sense, you wouldn't
say every time is a feast. But there is a love making a
feast. And there is those times when
we are brought into the banqueting house and the banner that is
over us is a banner of love. And we may say really, even though
there may not be special blessing times, Yet every time, even the
least grain of manna. Remember our Lord said in John
6 that Moses gave you not that manna from heaven, but my Father
giveth you the true manna. That manna is the Lord Jesus
Christ himself. And so there is that provision
that is made, a provision that is to supply day by day, but
a provision that can supply a banquet as well. What would we think
of someone on earth, a king? And all we are told, well, he
is just able to only just sustain his servants and those that work
for him, just in the same manner as what his poorest of the people
do. They get enough to live, but
that's all. But if we are told, well, it's
like Solomon's kingdom. And Queen of Sheba saw all the
richness, the fullness and everything that he had. It shows the potential
and the grandeur, the wonder of his kingdom. And really even
to get a taste once of such a banquet, you know what is there, you know
the potential is there. And I believe, I hope it is so
with us all that know the Lord, that we know if the Lord were
but to bless us, and really visit our souls. There is such a fullness,
we could not receive it. We could be, our poor minds,
we could not contain it. We must wait to get to heaven
to really see all what the Lord has done for us and for the Church
of God. But there is such a provision
and we do partake of it. I want to look at this in the
last point, a partaking, of this feast because it's vital that
we don't just read about it, we don't just hear it, we don't
just know it as a theory, but we do actually partake of it. That is very, very vital. We said about our Lord saying,
except ye eat the flesh and drink the blood of the Son of Man.
It must be a personal appetite given for the things of God,
a personal blessing. Blessed are they that hunger
and thirst after righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of
God. It is the blessing of the Lord
upon his people so that they do partake. There's some beautiful
types in the world again of this. We have Mephibosheth, Remember
he was Saul's son, or Jonathan's son, that when he was a young
lad he was dropped off his maid, or the carer, and he was lame
on both his feet. And yet David made a covenant
with Saul and with Jonathan that he would bless his seed and not
blot out his seed, show favour to his seed. And so when David
was the king, he sought out, and he asked, are there remaining
any of the seed of Jonathan that I may show him the favor for
my covenant's sake, for that promise's sake? And they said,
there is one. It's Mephibosheth, lame in both
his feet. He called for him. Poor Mephibosheth,
he must have greatly feared for his life. Must have thought,
well, all of my Father or grandfather had done to David, surely he
will slay me. The very first words David said
to him when he came was, fear not. But the blessing that David
blessed him with all the days of his life was to sit at the
king's table and eat at his table. Others looked after his lands
and he didn't have to worry. He had a provision already made
for him. And our text speaks of a feast
that is already made. It is already provided. And that
was the case with Mephibosheth. But he was lame. It didn't matter. How many of the people of God,
they feel like Mephibosheth. They're lame, they're poor, they're
defiled, they're sinners. They cannot feel to run in the
ways of the Lord. There's nothing in them to recommend
them to the Lord. No reason in them why the Lord
should bless them. And there wasn't anything in
Mephibosheth except the covenant and the promise. And that will
come down to it for every one of the people of God. Why me?
Why me? Why was I made to hear his voice
and enter while there's room while millions make a wretched
choice and rather starve than come? Why was it that I was called? Why was it my eyes were opened? Why was it the veil was taken
away from my eyes? Only because of the covenant,
the sovereign will of God and choice of God, the same as it
was with Mephibosheth. Mephibosheth could never say,
I am here feasting with the very best of the kingdom at the king's
table because of some good in me. He could never say that,
but he had that feast and he partook of that feast. And we've already mentioned about
those on the way to Emmaus and the Una. They feasted on these
things. And all that received the Gospel,
and all that received the Gospel in these days through the ministry,
through the Church of God, they feast upon these things as well. As they are opened up to our
eyes, they are meat and they are drink to our souls. They
satisfy the hungry soul with goodness and they fill us with
those things that the world cannot offer. It is a blessed thing
to have a value for that, an appetite for that. The Lord feeds
His people, with what the world does not know of, the same as
the children of Israel, no other nation knew the manner. No other
nation had a miraculous provision that they had. And so it is in
the Church of God as well, that we feed upon the Word. What a
sad thing, when the Word of God is neglected, when it's not read,
it's not set forth, how can we feed upon it? How can we live
if we have not? Amos, we read in the prophecy
of Amos, that in the last days there shall be a famine, not
of bread and of water, but of hearing the words of the Lord.
And that is a very solemn, very sad thing. That there should
be such a famine, literally, that the word is not heard. Or
a famine because the Holy Spirit is greatly withdrawn. And that
promise that our Lord said, he shall receive of mine and shall
show it unto you, that he has withdrawn and he is not doing
that. We need the Holy Spirit the same
as the Thessalonians did. Paul says, the word came unto
you, not in word only, but in demonstration of spirit and of
power. And that's what made it a feast
to them. because the power was there,
tarry at Jerusalem until ye be endued with power from on high. And that's what makes it a feast. There is a partaking and there's
a preparation for partaking. An appetite, a hunger, a thirst
are being brought to desire the things of God and to receive
those through the Holy Spirit and the Lord Jesus Christ being
made precious to that soul, and the truths of the gospel made
precious to a soul, those things which can never be exhausted. I had one thought as partaking
of this. We said of the wines and fermenting
and how long they actually laid on the leaves, really the leaves
which eventually had to be taken off. It was that which had fermented
and corrupted. There's one thing that God's
people, they know, that every man shall know the plague of
his own heart. Our Lord was very clear that
those that had been forgiven much, they loved much. Those
that had not been forgiven much, they loved little. Where sin is really known, mourned
over, where it is felt by the apostles, sin revived and I die,
the good that I would, I do not, the evil that I would, not that
I do, a wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from this
body of death? When we know really the malady,
then when the remedy is revealed and the apostle says, who shall
deliver me? I thank God through Jesus Christ
my Lord, then it is very precious. You know, if we've already supposedly
got a provision ourselves, we will not value that provision
of the Lord. When we think of in the temple
and the Pharisee praying, telling all the good that he'd done supposedly,
he never had a need of anything. But the publican standing afar
off, beat upon his breast, God be merciful to me a sinner. And
it is the more we actually know and realise our sinnership, the
more precious the Saviour will be. The more we realise our own
unrighteousness, the more we'll value His righteousness. The hymn writer says, if ever
my poor soul be saved, it is Christ that must be the way. There is none other name given
among men whereby we must be saved. When the Lord says about
growing grace and in the knowledge of the Lord, that's not growing
better and better in our own esteem. Grace is the free, unmerited
favour of God. It's the opposite to works. And
so the more and more we feel that our own works merit death
and hell and banishment from God, the more we'll value that
feast of fat things and that provision that the Lord has provided
of what he has done, not what we have done, what he has done.
How the Lord provides for his people. In Eden he put man into
a garden already done. In heaven he brings people, his
dear people, to a place already prepared for them. I go and prepare
a place for you. When the children of Israel went
to the promised land, they had not been able to build houses
or vineyards because they were all there and they were put into
it. And when we come to the gospel
church and the provision of the church, they find that the table
is already spread. The gospel table is there, the
provision is there. The food is there. All what a
poor sinner needs is already there, provided by the Lord. You think of when the Lord rose
from the dead, and He appeared on the seashore, and the disciples
were in the boat. They toiled all night, and they
had got nothing. And the Lord said to them, cast
the net on the right side of the ship. And they cast, and
the amount of fishes that were there, 153. and they brought them to the
land. But did they need those fishes
to feast upon? There was already a fire and
coals and fish. The Lord had already provided
for them. But in a beautiful way, he gave
them the type that he would make them fishes of men. But the Lord
makes that provision. He's made it in Jerusalem. He makes it in the Church of
God. He provides it through the preaching
of the Gospel, the preaching of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus
Christ. And in this mountain shall the
Lord of Hosts make unto all people a feast of fat things. The question is, do we partake
of it? Have we? Do we know that secret? Is the Lord precious to us? We
say with Jeremiah, thy words were found and I did eat them.
They were to the joy and rejoicing of my soul. Sweet to our taste, how vital to partake of it. The Lord give us a real appetite
for his word. And may we always know that there's
an exhaustless supply there. and it's opened up in the precious
wounded side of our Lord and what he has accomplished at Jerusalem,
swallowing up death in victory, wiping away the tears and the
faces of his people, the blessing. They shall say, this is our God. We have waited for him and he
will save us. We will be glad and rejoice in
his salvation. May the Lord add his blessing. Amen.