Good morning. Let's open this
morning's service with hymn number 37. Number 37. Let's all stand
together. Number 37. O Lord my God, may I in awesome
wonder Consider all the works thy hands hath made. I see the
stars, I hear the rolling thunder, Thy power throughout the universe
displayed. Then sings my soul, my Savior
God to Thee, How great Thou art! How great Thou art! Then sings my soul, my Savior
God, to Thee How great Thou art! How great Thou art! Went through the woods and forests
late I wander And hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees When I look down From lofty mountains
grand go, And hear the brook, and feel the gentle breeze. Then sings my soul, my Savior
God to Thee, How great Thou art, how great Thou art, And sings
my soul, my Savior God, to Thee. How great Thou art! How great Thou art! And I think that God, His Son
not sparing, Sent Him to die, I scarce can take it in. That on the cross, my burden
gladly bearing, He bled and died to take away my sin. Then sings my soul, my Savior
God, to Thee. How great Thou art! How great Thou art! Then sings my soul, my Savior
God, to Thee. How great Thou art! How great Thou art! When Christ shall come, with
shout of admiration, and take me home, what joy shall fill
my heart! and I shall bow in humble adoration
and there proclaim, my God, how great Thou art. Then sings my
soul, my Savior God, to Thee, how great Thou art. Then sings my soul, my Savior
God, to Thee, How great Thou art! How great Thou art! Is that right? Did I mess it
up? I think we're still good. Well, I would tell you that Ava
Carolina George has arrived into this world, but I suspect that
everybody already knows that. I was telling somebody the other
day, I was going to show them, oh, we've seen that. We've seen
that. I've discovered that in the age
of Facebook, there's no more need to make any announcement
about anything. Everybody already knows everything. I despise Facebook. All right. We thank the Lord
for her birth and rejoice with Alice and Carolina's first grandbaby. We're going to be looking at
Isaiah chapter 13 this morning. Isaiah. Chapter 13. Let's ask the Lord's blessings
on this word. Our merciful Heavenly Father. We asked Lord that. You'd be
pleased to Bless this hour with your Holy Spirit. We pray that
you would speak to our hearts, that you would reveal to us the
glory of thy dear son. We pray for the faith that we
need to trust him. We know, Lord, that that is a
gift from you. We ask that you would be gracious
to give it. We pray, Lord, that you would
grow us together in your grace. We thank you for little Ava. We pray for her and we ask Lord
that you'd be pleased to to make yourself known to her. Pray that
you would give Isaac and Alexandra the wisdom to to raise her in
the nurture and admonition of the Lord. And that, Lord, we
would have the joy of seeing your mercy upon her and upon
them for the glory of Christ. For it's in his name we pray.
Amen. The historical meaning of Isaiah
chapter 13 has to do with the prophecy that the Lord has given
Isaiah concerning the Babylonian exile and captivity that will
soon take place. And then God is prophesying the
destruction of Babylon and the delivery of his people from that
place. That having been said, we're
not really too interested in that this morning. I want to
know what does this have to say to me about Christ, about my
need for Him, and my understanding of the gospel of His free grace. And that being understood, we
know that Babylon is a picture of man-made religion. That's
clear all throughout the scriptures. The theme carries right through
to the 17th and 18th chapter of Revelation. But before we
get to that, I think it's very encouraging for us to know that
everything that our God does is for His glory through the
salvation of His people. Everything that happens in this
world. Everything. And that's clear. Let's read
this together, the first few verses of chapter 13. The burden
of Babylon which Isaiah the son of Amoz did see. That's what
I hope, that the Lord will burden our hearts with the reality of
Babylon and that he would enable us to see the truth of the gospel
as it's revealed in this passage. lift ye up a banner upon the
high mountains, exalt the voice unto them, shake the hand that
they may go into the gates of the nobles. I have commanded
my sanctified ones." Now that's a reference, historically, to
the Medes. The Medes are the ones that are
going to come in and destroy Babylon. And God's calling them
His sanctified ones. Now here the word sanctified
doesn't mean holy. Obviously the Medes were as pagan
as were the Babylonians. It means to be set apart. And
what the Lord is saying here is that I've got another nation.
that I'm going to use to destroy Babylon and to deliver my people
from their bondage. And that's why I say all these
events are taking place for the salvation of God's people. Nothing's
changed. That's still true. Everything
that happens in this world is happening under the hand of our
God for His glory. And He is glorified through the
salvation of His elect. And I take such great comfort
in that. He reigns sovereign over the
armies of heaven and all the inhabitants of the earth. And
no man can stay his hand or say unto him, what doest thou? He
does everything according to his will and according to his
purpose. And so the huge events that take
place in the world, God did that. and the little things that take
place in your life and in my life, all that the Lord would
give us the faith to see his hand at work in everything. That we'd be able to say with
Eli, it's the Lord. Whatever he sends, it's the Lord. He's using his sanctified ones
and he will use pagans to accomplish his purpose. But it's his purpose,
his purpose is the salvation of his people. That's his purpose. He's determined to deliver Israel
from Babylonian captivity and he's calling this other pagan
nation his sanctified ones. The word means to be set apart.
I've set them apart for my purpose. I was thinking this morning about
Teresa Edmondson. David Edmondson, who pastors
in Kentucky, and Teresa, his wife, is full-blooded Japanese. Her mother, Teresa's mother,
was sick the morning that we dropped the bomb on Hiroshima. And she stayed home from school
that day. And every child in her class
and every child in her school was vaporized that morning. Teresa's mother, fourth grader,
stayed home. Teresa, the only member of her
family that's a believer. God did that. God did that. There's no Dennis Spitzton's
going to be here in a few weeks, Lord willing, and preach for
us on a Wednesday night. And there's no doubt in my mind
that the Lord raised up Ronald Reagan to put his finger in Gorbachev's
face and say to him, take down that wall, that Eugene and Natalie
could come here and hear the gospel and have Eugene and, I
mean, have Dennis and Jason and Dennis preaching. You know, it's
the Lord. And those are just things that
we can see. Everything that's taking place
is for the salvation of His people. It's the only agenda that God
has in this world. It's the only thing that matters.
Everything else is just props. The only thing that matters is
the salvation of God's people. And when the last of His elect
come to the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, He's going
to roll this whole thing up and it's going to be over with. The
only reason the world's here, the only reason there's governments
are here, the only reason that everything is here is for the
salvation of God's people. Do you believe that? It's true? It's true. Now, that's the lesson that I
think to be learned from the historical setting of what the
Lord's doing in delivering His people from Babylon And he's
saying, I'm going to raise up kings, and they're my sanctified
ones. They're the ones that I'm going
to use. Look what he says in verse 3. I have also called my
mighty ones for mine anger, even them that rejoice in my highness. Now, the spiritual meaning of
this whole chapter is the work of grace that God does in the
hearts of his believers, his children, when they come to understand
what Babylon really is. and they slay in their hearts. We don't go out fighting against
the religions of this world, but when the Lord is pleased
to make himself known to you, one of the very first experiences
that you have is to put to death all the Babylonian experiences
that you've ever had prior to that in your life. Now Babylon
starts with Babel in Genesis chapter 11, doesn't it? And you
remember what they said in Genesis chapter 11? Let us make bricks
and heat them thoroughly with fire. And so they had bricks
for stone and slime for mortar. That's what they built, that's
what they tried to build that tower out of. that we might build
a city and a tower that reaches up into heaven, that we might
make a name for ourselves. That's what they said. And that's
all man-made religion is, fashioning bricks with his own hands and
heating them in the fire and putting them together with slime. Now, slime doesn't make a very
good mortar, does it? Burke painted a church. You remember
that church he painted up in DeLand? And I came up and helped
him one day. And this church was built in
the 30s or 40s. It was a black church. And the
people that built it were very poor at the time that the church
was built. And we talked to some of the older members there. And
they said that they couldn't afford enough concrete for the
mortar. It was a red brick church. And
you could take your finger and run it between the bricks and
scrape the mortar out. The church was falling apart
because it was put together with faulty mortar. Can you imagine
building a building and using tar as your mortar? Soon as the heat of the sun gets
up, that thing's gonna fall down, isn't it? It's a picture of man-made
religion. He's cut corners and he's trying
to build a tower to heaven to make a name for himself. And what did the Lord do? What'd
the Lord do? He confused their language. What's
that a picture of? It's a picture of the plurality
of religions in the world. That's what it is. And we're
blessed to live in a country where there's lots of different
religious opinions. Can you imagine if we lived in
a Muslim stronghold in the Middle East and believed what we believe?
They put us to death today. If you lived in a Pueblo, and
I've been to those Pueblos in Mexico, they're Roman Catholic
strongholds, and you belong to that little grace church that
was in that town, you're going to suffer persecution like we
don't suffer. Well, if you lived in Salem,
Massachusetts in the late 1600s and you didn't agree with everything
that the Puritans were teaching, they'd probably hunt you down
as a witch and burn you at the stake. Salem witch hunt. You see what I'm saying? If you
live in a place where there's only one religious opinion and
you're not in agreement with that religious opinion, so what
did the Lord do at Babel? He confused their language, and
we've got lots of people saying lots of different things about
God, don't we? And that's to our benefit. That's to our benefit. We're still persecuted. If you
stand for the gospel, you're going to be ostracized. But it's
to our benefit that we live. Here's just another work of God's
grace. providing a place for his church. And it was the Lord that sent
them a strong delusion that they should believe a lie because
they had no love for the truth. 2 Thessalonians chapter 2, you
know that's what that says. And that's what the Lord has
done in the world. He's the one who sent them that
perverse religion. And why did he do it? Why do
you do it? To provide for us safety in this
world, to be able to live at peace and worship God in peace. So
that Babylonian, it's just, turn with me to Revelation chapter
17. Revelation chapter 17. Here's man-made religion. Let
us make bricks. The Lord said when you build
an altar, don't put your hand to it. Don't make it out of bricks
and don't take stones and use them with your hand because as
soon as you put your hand to them, you've defiled it. The
altar that God's pleased with is made out of unhewn stones. It's a stone that his hand has
cut. And it's speaking of Christ,
of course. We don't put our hands to the work of the Lord Jesus
Christ. He accomplished the work of redemption
all by himself. And we don't try to put our doctrines
and our views of God together with slime. The Lord builds the truth of
the gospel with his word and knits our hearts together in
the love of Christ. So here's man-made religion that
we might do what? Make a name for ourselves. We're
not interested in Christ getting all the glory. We want to make
a name for ourselves. We're going to make some contribution
to our salvation in order to take pride in who we are. In Revelation chapter 17 and
verse 1, and there came one of the seven angels which had the
seven vials and talked with me saying unto me, come hither and
I will show unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth
upon many waters. With whom the kings of the earth
have committed fornication and the inhabitants of the earth
have been drunk with the wine of fornication. So he carried
me away in the spirit of the wilderness and I saw a woman.
sit upon a scarlet colored beast full of names of blasphemy having
seven heads and ten horns and the woman was arrayed in purple
and scarlet color and decked with gold and precious stones
and pearls having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations
and filthiness of her fornication." He's speaking of just man-made
religion. all the ceremony that man comes
up with in an attempt to try to earn favor with God. And upon
her forehead was the name written, Mystery Babylon, the great mother
of harlots and abominations of the earth. And I saw the woman
drunken with the blood of the saints and with the blood of
the martyrs of Jesus. And when I saw her, I wondered
with great admonition. Now the next chapter talks about
the destruction of Babylon and look at verse 2 of chapter 18. And he cried mightily with a
strong voice saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen
and has become the habitation of devils and the hold of every
foul spirit and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. And
all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication.
And the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her.
And the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance
of her delicacies. And I heard another voice from
heaven saying, now here's God's word to you and me. Come out
of her, my people, that you may be not partakers of her sins,
and that you receive not of her plagues. For her sins have reached
unto heaven, and God hath rewarded her iniquities." So here's God's
word to you and me. Don't have anything to do with
man-made religion. Come out of her. Be separate, saith the Lord. She is a vessel fitted for destruction. God's going to destroy her. And
that's what this prophecy's about. Yes, it was fulfilled historically
in the fourth century BC when the Medes came in and destroyed
Babylon in order to deliver Israelites back to Jerusalem. But the spiritual
application of this is the eternal destruction of Babylon when God
destroys her for her fornication. Look, let's go back to Isaiah
chapter 13. I was talking with a gospel preacher
recently and he was grieving over the fact that there were
people in his congregation that that were there on a regular
basis, but yet they were at the same time toying with the opinions of manmade religion. And I thought, you know, that
would be a grievous thing. I don't know if we have anybody
that would do that. But I would be grieved if you
did or if I did, because a little bit of leaven leavens the whole
lump. And once the Lord teaches you
the truth of the gospel, you just can't go back. Babylon is
put to death in your heart. And look what he says in verse
4. The noise of a multitude in the
mountains like as a great people a tumultuous noise of the kingdoms
of nations gathered together, the Lord of hosts mustereth the
host of the battle." There's a battle that's been won. The
battle was fought on Mount Calvary 2,000 years ago. And the Lord
destroyed the works of the devil. Babylon is the work of the devil. And when he's pleased to make
himself known to us, that destruction becomes part of our faith, doesn't
it? Look what he says in verse five. They come from a far country
from the ends of heaven, even the Lord and the weapons of his
indignation to destroy the whole land. The whole land, they don't
leave any of it alive. How ye, for the day of the Lord
is at hand, it shall come as a destruction from the Almighty. Therefore shall all hands be
faint, and every man's heart shall melt. And they shall be
afraid. Pains and sorrows shall take
hold of them. They shall be in pain as a woman
that travaileth. They shall be amazed one at another. Their faces shall be as flames.
Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, cruel, both with wrath and fierce
anger, to lay the land desolate. And he shall destroy the sinners
thereof out of it." So, when the wrath of God fell from heaven,
on the Lord Jesus Christ, the sin bearer. This was fulfilled
spiritually. It's going to be fulfilled eternally
when this world is finally over with, when God's done with it,
and the last of his elect come into the kingdom of God. It's
going to be destroyed. This is experienced every time
a child of God meets the Lord Jesus Christ for the first time.
They come to realize how grievous their views of God were when
they were engaged in Babylonian worship. Verse 10, for the stars of heaven
and the constellations thereof shall not give their light. The
sun shall be darkened and is going forth and the moon shall
not cause her light to shine. Jude refers to false prophets
as wandering stars. Now, if you lived prior to the
age of GPS, I guess, you would have to use the stars to navigate.
And all the stars in the heavens, they travel in a predictable
pattern. And yet there are planets that
to the naked eye look like stars, but they're not stars. And the
reason you know they're planets is because they don't follow
the predictable pattern of the stars. And so they were called
wandering stars. You can't navigate by them. You
never know where they're going to be. They're not in the same
position in relationship to the other stars all the time. They're
always moving. And the Lord called false prophets
wandering stars. You can't navigate by them. You
never know where they're going to be. They're always coming
up with a new opinion and a new idea. And all those stars in
the heavens, what are they revolving around? What star never moves? The North Star. The North Star
never moves. All the stars revolve around
that. So the Lord says that when this wrath of God comes against
Babylon, the stars are going to be darkened. The moon is going
to be darkened. That happened on Calvary's cross
when God cut off the Lord Jesus Christ because of the sin that
he saw on him. He had no choice but to forsake
him. And it happens in our hearts
when the Lord reveals the truth to us. Those things that we thought
were sources of navigation, we now understand were a lie from
Babylon, the mother of all harlots. And we don't have anything to
do with them anymore. Verse 11, I will punish the world
for their evil and the wickedness of their iniquity and I will
cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease and I will lay low the
haughtiness of the terrible. Have you had that experience?
I will cause the arrogance of the proud to cease. There was
a time when we thought that we had something that we could bring
to the table of salvation. We thought that was either my
free will or my works or my contribution is somehow going to make what
Jesus did work for me. I can do something to bring Him
down from above. I can bring something to bring
Him up from below. And when the Lord reveals Christ
to you, The arrogance is revealed for what it is and you're humbled
before God and realizing that I can't do anything. I can't
bring anything. He's got to do it all for me. Look at verse 12. I will. God speaking. Every time you and I say, I will,
we're on our way to trouble, aren't we? We just, we really
are. But when God says, I will, you
can be sure it's gonna happen. Now, what does he say? I will
make a man more precious than gold. Who is that man? Has God made the Lord Jesus Christ
your life. Is he more precious to you? He's the only hope you have. I will make a man more precious
than gold. What does it profit a man if
he gains the whole world and loses his own soul? Oh, Lord,
thank you for making the God-man, the man who is in the heavens
interceding on my behalf, more precious to me than anything
else. Even a man than the golden wedge
of Ophir, therefore I will shake the heavens and the earth shall
remove out of her place in the wrath of the Lord of hosts and
in the day of his fierce anger." Now again, There's really kind
of four applications to this. There's the historical, which
took place in the fifth century BC. There's the spiritual that
took place on Calvary's cross. There's the experience that you
and I have when the Lord's pleased to open the eyes of our understanding
and give us life in Christ. And then there's that ultimate
destruction of Babylon that we read about in Revelation chapter
17 and 18. And this is God's promise, this
is gonna happen. So the question that you and
I have to ask is, has it happened for me? Has the Lord destroyed
Babylon in my heart? Has he made the man, the God-man,
the Lord Jesus Christ, has he made him everything to me? What's verse 13? He's shaking
the heavens and the earth. Verse 14, and it shall be as
the chaste row and as a sheep that no man taketh up, they shall,
every man turn to his own people and flee everyone to his own
land. Everyone that is found shall be thrust through and everyone
that is joined unto them shall fall by the sword Their children
also shall be dashed to pieces before their eyes. Their homes
shall be spoiled and their wives ravished. Behold, I will stir
up the meads against them, which shall not regard silver, and
as for gold, they shall not delight in it. Their bows also shall
dash the young men to pieces, and they shall have no pity on
the fruit of the womb. Their eye shall not spare children. And Babylon, the glory of kingdoms,
the beauty of the Chaldees, excellency, shall be as when God overthrew
Sodom and Gomorrah, it shall never be inhabited again. Now
we know that that happened. I mean, that's happened. The Babylon that was destroyed
in the fourth and fifth century BC was inhabited again. We've
destroyed it again, haven't we, in our lifetime. But here's the,
it's never going to be inhabited. Once the Lord puts to death that
Babylonian empire in your heart and causes you to see that all
the opinions of man's religion are slated for God's wrath and
destruction. You don't want anything to do
with them. Come out of her, my people. And you've come out.
You've come out. And you never want to go back.
Look what he says. And it shall never be inhabited,
verse 20, neither shall it dwell in from generation to generation,
neither shall the Arabian pitch tent there, neither shall the
shepherds make their fold there. But the wild beast of the desert
shall live there, and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures,
and the owls shall dwell there, and the satyrs shall dance there,
and the wild beast of the island shall cry in their desolate houses,
and dragons in their pleasant palaces. and her time is near
to come and her days shall not be prolonged." When we look at
Babylon today, spiritual Babylon, what do we see? What do we see? We see wild beasts living there,
don't we? There's no life there. There's no presence of God there.
There's no hope of salvation there. It's cursed of God, and we've
come out. We've come out. All right, let's
take a break. th