Brethren, let's turn to Isaiah
chapter 60. Isaiah chapter 60. Let's begin reading in verse
9. He says, Surely the isles shall
wait for me, and the ships of Tarshish first. to bring thy
sons from far, their silver and their gold with them, unto the
name of the Lord thy God and to the Holy One of Israel, because
He hath glorified thee. And the sons of the strangers
shall build up thy walls, and their kings shall minister unto
thee. For in my wrath I smote thee,
but in my favor have I had mercy on thee. Therefore thy gate shall
be open continually they shall not be shut day nor night That
men may bring unto thee the forces of the Gentiles and that their
kings may be brought For the nation and kingdom that will
not serve thee shall perish Yea, those nations shall be utterly
wasted the glory of Lebanon shall come unto thee the fir tree the
pine tree the and the box together to beautify the place of my sanctuary. And I will make the place of
my feet glorious. The sons also of them that afflicted
thee shall come bending unto thee. And all they that despise
thee shall bow themselves down at the soles of thy feet. And
they shall call thee the city of the Lord, the Zion of the
Holy One of Israel." Now this is a This whole chapter is the
Lord Jesus comforting His church. He's speaking in comfort to His
church. And He's comforting His church,
declaring what He's going to do, and what He's going to do
using us. Using His church. What He's going
to accomplish. Using us to preach the gospel.
And it's great comfort. He begins in verse 9 with the
word, surely. Surely. And when I read that
word, I just stopped. I kind of went back and started
the first verse and just went through the chapter, looking
at how certain this is. Our Lord is not like anything
like the God of this world. The God of this world speaks
in maybes. The God of this world can only
do what His Creator lets Him do. And His Creator is man. The God that most people worship,
is the creation that they've created in their mind. And he
can't do anything but what they let him do. And so he can't speak
and say, surely. It's always maybe. It's always
if it's dependent upon the sinner. But our God's absolutely sovereign. Is anything too hard for the
Lord? That's what the Scriptures say. And Job said, no. Job said, there's nothing too
hard for thee. Nothing's too hard for the Lord.
Thou can do everything. There's no thought that can be
withheld from thee. Whatsoever the Lord pleased.
You and I have never said we could do whatsoever we pleased
ever. If you go on vacation and don't
have anything going on so that you're free, as we call it, you
still can't do whatsoever you please. God can do whatsoever
He's pleased to do in the heavens and in the earth. That's who
He is. And I'll remind you of this too.
The God that we're talking about is Christ our Savior. Christ
our Savior, risen. And the most important thing
to remember is He's not just sovereign over things and sovereign
over people and sovereign over providence. He's sovereign in
salvation. He's sovereign in salvation.
So that whatever He purposed is coming to pass. And He's got
some parameters on Himself. He won't do anything contrary
to His holiness. Whatever He does is going to
be in accordance with His holiness, and yet He can still do that. He can still put away sin and
establish righteousness and honor His law and do it in a way that's
according to His holiness. That's how sovereign God is.
God has sent forth His Son, and His Son has laid His life down
and accomplished the redemption of His people, and Christ is
sending forth the gospel now. from heaven, and he's accomplishing
God's will. Calling out his people, building
up his church, and he won't stop until he's finished the work.
He's going to call them all. Somebody objects, say, well,
I don't like that God's sovereign. I don't like that God's sovereign
in salvation. Paul said, Nay, O man, who art
thou that replyest against God? Shall the thing formed say to
him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? Me and you
going to say something to God and question God about what God's
doing? God's going to do what He will. And we're going to bow. And if we don't bow, He's going
to make us bow. And if we're His, He's going
to make us bow in mercy. And we're going to be thankful.
Now let me remind you again, this is Christ we're talking
about. This is Christ who's running, He's running everything. When
He came to His disciples and sent them forth to preach the
gospel, if He would have just said, go forth now into all the
world and preach the gospel, I'll see you at the end of the
world, that wouldn't have been much comfort. But He said, all
powers given unto me in heaven and in earth, go forth therefore
and preach this gospel and I'll be with you always. Wherever
you go, I'm with you. He has all power. All power. So when we hear the Lord say,
surely, remember this is the promise of our God and our Savior
who has all power, who cannot fail. And this is His promise
to us, His church. And this is His promise of what
He's going to do through His church. First of all, He says
this. We're going to ask this question.
Who's going to come? Who shall come? He says, verse
9, the owls. Surely the owls. Who are the
owls? That's the Gentiles. When you
read the owls in Scripture, He's speaking about the Gentiles. Now, I've told you this often
in Scripture. And whenever the Lord came and
He started His work on this earth, He was not sent but to the lost
sheep of the house of Israel. He started with Israel. He started calling out Israel.
And when he sent his disciples forth, he started in Israel.
And then he told them, but when they reject the gospel, then
you turn and go to the Gentiles. And when God broke up Jerusalem
in 70 AD and just scattered them into the four winds, at that point, God wasn't recognizing
a political Israel anymore. It's just Gentiles. And He's
calling out His elect among the Gentiles. And when all His elect
among the Gentiles are called out, all Israel will be saved. All Israel will be saved. But these Gentiles are not all
Gentiles. It doesn't mean everybody in
the world. Verse 9 says, Thy sons. Thy sons. That's who's going to be brought.
Thy sons. And He's speaking to you and
me, the church. And He's telling the church, Thy sons shall be
brought. Look down at verse 10. He calls
them the sons of strangers. That means they're God's sons
called out from among the stranger. The Gentile world, the nations
all over the world. So see here, the ones that are
going to be called out are the sons of God. That's what makes
them qualified to be called out. God chose them. They're the sons
of God. And Christ redeemed them. And
He's calling them out. Not only from among the Gentiles,
but look at this. Even from among our enemies.
Look at verse 14. The sons also of them that afflicted
thee shall come. Sons that afflicted thee shall
come. I thought about Saul of Tarsus right off the right off
the bat, he afflicted the church. And if you'd have been living
in solitarsis today, we'd have said, there's no hope for that
man. He won't ever be saved. But it
wasn't too hard for the Lord. He called him and brought him
down. And then I was asking the men,
could you think of any Gentiles that afflicted the church that
were called? They said a whole church of Ephesus.
The whole church at Ephesus, remember that? They were lost
and in an uproar because they had a bunch of money invested
in their idol-making businesses. And they didn't want to see that
business go down the drain. And there was all kinds of trouble.
God called out a bunch of them. Called them out. And made them
throw away their idols and their idol-making business. Put them
out of business. Why is there certainty that these
sons will be called out? Why is it certain they'll be
called out? Because they're sons. That's why. They're sons. They're
sons. Chosen by God and redeemed, justified
by Christ. John 10, 14. You know what the
Lord said? He said, I'm the good shepherd
and I know my sheep. I know my sheep. That's who we're
talking about. I know my sheep, and I'm known
of mine, as the Father knows me, even so know I the Father,
and I lay down my life for the sheep. And other sheep I have,
which are not of this fold." He was sitting there, sent to
the lost sheep of the house of Israel. The spiritual elect among
political Israel was who he was sent to. To minister to them
in person while he walked this earth. And he said, but I have
other sheep and they're not of this folk. And he said, and them
I also must bring. That's his people all over the
world. And he said, I must bring them.
Why? Because he laid down his life for them. He justified them.
They must be brought. Punishment can't be poured out
on them. It's been satisfied. They must be brought. Alright?
Who shall they come to? Here's the next question. Who
shall they come to? Verse 9 says, Surely the isles
shall wait for me. They'll wait for me, he said.
This is Christ speaking. at the last part of that verse,
and he says in verse 9, he says, and they're going to come to
the name of the Lord thy God and to the Holy One of Israel. That's who they're coming to.
That's who they're coming to. This is a prophecy. Look at Romans
chapter 1. This is a prophecy. What did
Christ say that He must and shall do with all prophecy? He said He must fulfill it. He
must fulfill it. He came to fulfill everything
that's written. And this scripture that's written,
He said, they're going to come to me. And so He's going to fulfill
that prophecy. Now look here, here's an example
of some people that He fulfilled this prophecy in. Romans 1.1,
Paul said, I'm a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle,
separated unto the gospel of God. And he said, which he promised
before by the prophets in the Holy Scriptures. The reason I
believe, Paul said, and the reason I'm called, and the reason I'm
a prophet, I mean an apostle, and the reason I'm preaching
Christ and Him crucified, this was all promised back there in
the prophets. Every bit of this. Look, he says,
concerning His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. Old Testament's all
about Jesus Christ our Lord. I didn't realize it until I got
here that both my messages is more or not Old Testament. But
that's alright, because the whole Old Testament's concerning the
Lord Jesus Christ. That's who we're going to see
when we look at the next scripture. And he said this, He was made
of the seed of David according to the flesh, declared the Son
of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness by the
resurrection from the dead. Now look at what Paul said. By
whom? By whom? By Him we have received
grace, that's how we were saved, and apostleship. We were called
and put into office to go preach. And He called us for this, for
the obedience to the faith among all nations. To go forth into
all nations preaching this. Why? for His name. Who did He say they're going
to come to? The name of the Lord. And He did this for His name,
to draw them to the name of the Lord. And He writes here and
He says, Among whom are ye also the called of Jesus Christ? The called of Jesus Christ. That
means Jesus Christ called those Paul's writing to. Who were they? To all that be in Rome. Beloved
of God, called to be saints, He says, grace to you and peace
from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. That's who He said
was going to call them and that's who they were coming to. God
our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Now it says in our text
in Isaiah 60, it says there in verse 9, when He calls, He says,
they're going to wait for Me. What does that mean? They're
going to wait for Me. But when He calls His people,
He makes His people desire Christ. That's what the word wait means,
desire. He makes you desire Christ. He makes you have a willingness
for Christ, a hunger and a thirst after righteousness. And Christ
is that righteousness. He gives you desire for Christ.
And it also means that you have hope. Hope. I'm going to make
them hope in me. Hope in me. We have a good hope. We're hoping in Christ's promise
that He's going to return and He's going to conform us perfectly
to His image in perfect righteousness. And that's a sure hope. Just
like we see Him fulfilling these scriptures, He's going to fulfill
that scripture. And He's going to return. That's a good hope.
He said, I'm going to make them wait on Me. Hope in Me. And it
also means this. Observe His will. I'm going to
make them observe My will. And they're going to submit to
My will. What's His will? This is the will of Him that
sent Me. This is the will of Him that
sent Me. Whosoever believes on the Lord Jesus Christ may have
eternal life. That's His will. And He's going
to bring His people to be willing to put away our works, put away
our self-righteousness, put away all the things we've been doing
to try to come to God and make us willing to submit to Christ
for all, for everything. That's what He does. And to follow
Him and want to obey Him, desire to obey Him. And then look, He
says here, What are they going to bring? What are they going
to bring? Verse 9, he says, they are going
to bring silver and gold with them. Silver and gold with them. Now, if you talk to the papists,
if you listen to them, you know, you look at the something they
got going on around Christmas time, or if you've been in their
cathedrals or what have you, and you see all this gold and
all this silver. I mean, it's everywhere. And
they fleece the people. poor people down in Mexico, they
just fleece the people. And then they take all that,
and they get as much silver and gold, and gold plate everything,
and silver plate everything, and they got everything covered
in gold and silver in their cathedrals, and then they take a scripture
like this, and they say, see there, that means we're the church
of God. Well, that's not what that means. They're the synagogue
of Satan is what they are. And that's not what this means.
What this means is, it means every child that God calls into
His church, every child He calls into His church, He's going to
make His child willing to consecrate themselves to the Lord God, our
Holy One, Christ Jesus. We're going to come to Him, we're
going to rest in Him, and we're going to be consecrated to serve
Him alone. Now we have the true riches.
We've got the unsearchable riches. Now we've got true salvation,
and we don't have salvation in money. Now we got true contentment
in Christ. We're not trying to find contentment
in gold and silver anymore. We got the true silver and the
true gold. Christ Jesus, the riches of God.
And now we see how important the preaching of the Gospel is.
Just remember what we saw Thursday night? You don't know how important
the preaching of the Gospel is until you experience the power
of Christ and the wisdom of Christ in the call that He calls His
people with through the preaching of the Word of the Cross. And
when you've experienced it, now you realize this is of utmost
importance. It's of utmost importance. And
not only that, you look upon your brethren and you see how
much Christ paid to redeem your brethren. And you know they're
of utmost importance. They're of utmost importance.
Now you combine all of this together, not trusting in riches, being
content in Christ, seeing the value of the gospel, seeing the
value of our brethren, and you've got yourself a believer who has
been made to serve the Lord Jesus Christ willingly and trust Christ to provide for
him. That's the first thing this means.
Not fleecing people, not trying to point to gold and silver and
say, look, look at this. The second thing is this, Christ
himself, when he does this, he's going to elevate his church to
the highest honor. He's going to take each person
he calls and he's going to adorn each person with the riches,
the true riches. And He's going to adorn His whole
church with provisions and everything so that believers no longer have
to worry about anything. We don't have to worry about
anything. Are you worried that God's going
to charge you with sin? He put it away. Are you worried
you're going to be found naked in the day of judgment? He's
closed us in His righteousness. You're worried He's going to
bring up some work, past, present, or future, and condemn you for
it? We're standing in Christ's works. Not our own, in Christ's
works. And everything we need, He's
going to provide it for us in this life. Why? So we don't have
to worry. So we can actually concentrate
on what He calls us to concentrate on and focus on what He's called
us to focus on. And that's further in this gospel.
and serving His people. That's what He provides you.
Now, look at this. Verse 9, He says He does this
because He has glorified thee. He's glorified thee. He's shined
the light on thee. In your heart, He's robed you. He's fed you. This is what He's
done. Verse 13, the glory of Lebanon
shall come unto thee. This was a place where they had
the biggest trees and everybody went to Lebanon to get the trees
to come and build the temples and everything else. Now look
at what he says, I'm going to bring the glory of Lebanon to
you. I'm going to bring the fir tree and the pine tree and the
box tree together to beautify the place of my sanctuary. He says that's what I'm going
to do and I'll make the place of my feet glorious. Don't you
like that? The church is where Christ's
feet are. It's where He's walking. In the
midst of His people. He's walking amongst the candlesticks.
He's walking in the midst of His people. It's where His feet
are. And Christ says, I'm going to beautify it. It's His holy
place. It's His sanctuary. And I'm going
to beautify it, He says. And He says here, He's going
to do it. He's going to adorn it with the
fir tree and the pine tree and the box tree. And He says, I'm
going to make them all dwell together in harmony and unity
in Christ. Now, if you took some plain trees
that you'd cut down out of Lebanon, just plain trees, I'm sure you
could make some pretty wood out of it with what they had. But
it's not going to be near as pretty as when it's adorned in
Christ the silver and gold of His righteousness and His holiness
and His redemption. When it's covered in His covering,
it's going to be beautiful then. And I'm going to show you in
the next hour, we're going to see what we were before is Luz. That means an almond tree. An
almond tree. Just a plain old unadorned almond
tree. But when Christ gets done with
us, we're going to be Bethel, the house of God. Adorned with
His adornments. The house of God. Rich in redemption
and precious righteousness and holiness in Christ Himself. And
Christ is the head and the provider. We don't receive any of the glory.
I don't receive it. You don't receive it. None of
the glory. He gets all the glory. He gets
all the glory. I'll tell you a sure way to know
that Christ has not worked in the heart to make somebody generous,
and that's it, if they brag about it. Or if they want some attention
because of it. Christ didn't do that. Because
the sinner knows, I can't boast about my works, can you? I can't
boast that I obtained a righteousness of my own. I didn't. It's all
of Him. I can't boast in anything that
I sanctified myself. It's all of Him. I can't boast
in anything. And anybody that goes around
boasting about their works and what they've done and what they've
given to God, what they've given to God's people, what they've
given to His church, that's not of God. Because He makes His
people realize, you didn't give anything. He gave it all. He
said, I'll glorify thee. I'm going to beautify my sanctuary. I'm going to make the place of
my feet beautiful. Look at Isaiah 61.3. Talking
about these trees. Look here. He says, I'm going
to point unto them that mourn in Zion. All they are is just
crying and bawling over their sin. They can't do a thing about
it. I'm going to point unto them beauty for ashes. Beauty for
ashes. The oil of joy in the place of
their mourning. The garment of praise for that
Spirit of heaviness. That they might be called trees
of righteousness. of whose righteousness? Of our
own righteousness? Trees of His righteousness. Look, the planting of the Lord
that He might be glorified. He said, I'm going to do this.
I'm going to glorify my people. I'm going to beautify my house.
I'm going to plant them in my house. And I'm going to adorn
them with all my riches. And that's what He does. Now,
fourth thing. Christ always does this work so that it's obvious
He did the work. It's obvious He did the work.
Look at verse 10. He says, The sons of strangers shall build
up thy walls, and their kings shall minister unto thee. For
in my wrath I smoke thee, but in my favor have I had mercy
on thee. Before God builds up, you know
what He's going to do? He's going to tear it down. Before
He builds up, He's going to tear it down. He's going to do that
with us individually. When He saves us, when He has
to humble us, whatever it is. And He's going to do that with
His church. But now look what He says, In my wrath I smoke
thee, but in my favor I have mercy on thee. It was in God's
wrath that He smoked Christ. In wrath, he smoked Christ. When
he made him sin for his people, he smoked him with that strict
blow of justice that his people deserve, you and me who are his
people, that we deserve. He smoked him. But he satisfied
that. He settled that debt that we
owe so that now everything God's doing to his people, it's not
punishment, and it's not anger, and it's not wrath. It's the
loving, chastening, merciful hand of a loving Father. Everything He's doing, everything
He's doing, it's in His favor that He has mercy on us. When
the Lord Jesus Christ came, what did Israel look like? They were
proud. They were proud. You see this
time and again through history. They were proud. And just like
in Isaiah's day, they become proud. And they got built up
and got a lot of numbers and they got proud. They thought
they were something. And that they had built this
thing. And so what did the Lord do? He tore them down. He sent enemies in there and
just tore it down. And once he got it whittled down to nothing,
you know what he did? He sent Isaiah saying, I'm going to build
it. Preaching this message right
here, I'm going to build it. And I'm going to beautify it. And
I'm going to do it in a way to make you know I did it. That's
what he says. And then when Christ came, the
same thing had happened. They done got puffed up again.
They were in bondage then when He came. But we're always in
bondage when we think we're proud and in need of nothing. And they
were in bondage. And He came to them and He preached
the gospel to them, but they rejected Him. So you know what
He did? Christ took a handful of apostles.
Just a handful of apostles. Nobodies. Fishermen and publicans
and people that nobody would even look at and say, well that's
somebody. He took nobodies. And then He sent Rome into Jerusalem
and just tore them down. Just tore them down. But through
His apostles, He built it. On his own. And he'll do this.
He'll do this with his people. Look at this. It's obvious he
does it. These Gentiles, these sons of
the strangers, they weren't seeking Christ. You know, Romans 9, the
Gentiles weren't seeking righteousness. They weren't even seeking righteousness.
Israel was seeking righteousness by their works, by the law. Who
was found? Christ said, I was found to them
that sought Me not. Why? Because He went and found
them. He went and built it. That's what he does. And look
here, you got kings, they wasn't seeking God. A sinful publican on his face
and a proud religious Pharisee. One of them, religious men wouldn't
even be caught near. The other one, they'd love to
hang out with him. They'd be a good member to have
right on the front row. Christ said that man right there
went down to his house, still in his sin, still under the wrath
of God, and that man went to his house justified. The publican. Take a harlot with nothing. Nobody wants to be around her.
She's a harlot. That's all she is. And you got
a learned scribe that you think everybody's looking up to. Which
one did he say? The harlot. The harlot. Takes nobody's. nobody's, and
makes them righteous and teaches them the way. The chief of sinners. So here's the application to
us. After we've heard all this, now here's what he says. Verse
11. Therefore, thy gates, speaking to his church, to his kingdom,
to his city, thy gates shall be opened continually. They shall
not be shut day nor night. that men may bring unto thee
the forces of the Gentiles, and that their kings may be brought."
When you read forces of the Gentiles and their kings, he's talking
about his people, just who we saw, his sons that are going
to be brought through the gospel. He's saying, so he says here,
your gates are going to be open all the time. Now let me ask
you a question. After what we've seen here, what
we've heard here, who's keeping these gates open? Us or him? Is it us or him keeping these
gates open? Everything he just said is what
he works. It's what he works. And when
it's day and times are good, he said, your gates are going
to be open. And he said, when it's night,
when times are lean, your gates are going to be open. Oh, we
can keep them open when times are good. No, we need him to
keep them open then. And when times are lean, we need
Him to keep them open. And He said, I'm going to keep
them open. Your doors shall not be shut. Why? So that men, men,
His preacher, His missionaries, His evangelists, so that men
may bring unto Thee, My church, My bride, My kingdom, My city,
may bring unto Thee, Thy sons, My people, My people. You know, this nation thinks
that political Israel. If we don't protect political
Israel, we're going to be wasted and destroyed. That's what this
world thinks. You know, there wasn't even a
place called political Israel. Till very recently in our history,
they built it back again and called it Israel. You read Isaiah,
he said, you build it back, I'm going to throw it down. He's
the one who threw it down in the first place. Build it back. I'm going to tear it down because
I'm going to be the one to build my kingdom, he said. That's what
this world thinks. Oh, we've got to serve them or
we're going to perish. They get it from verse 12. Verse 12. But Christ
is speaking to his spiritual Israel. He's speaking to his
church. He's speaking to me and you who believe. Listen to this.
The nation and kingdom that will not serve thee shall perish. That's who he's talking to. He's
talking to his church. The nation that will not serve
thee shall perish. Yea, those nations shall be utterly
wasted. Now, you can be sure of this.
You see who God says we are? This is why we can be sure of
this. Look now who he says we are. Verse 14 at the end. He
says, they're going to call you the city of the Lord. The city of the Lord. The Zion
of the Holy One of Israel. And if you don't believe me that
he's talking about the church, go to Hebrews 12 and read it.
You'll see that he tells believers, you've come to Mount Zion. You've
come to the city of the living God. You've come to heavenly
Jerusalem. You haven't come to an earthly mountain that can
be touched. You can't touch this mountain. This is a spiritual
mountain. This is God's house. It's God's church. It's God's
people. Now look at this. It's the city of the Lord. It's His name. And it's the Zion
of the Holy One of Israel. That means God's name, God our
Father's name, and His Son, the Holy One of Israel's name, is
on this city and on this church. That's our assurance. Nothing's
going to happen to it. That's our assurance the doors are going
to be open. That's our assurance He's going to provide. That's
our assurance that the nations that do not serve us are going
to utterly perish. Why? He's not going to let anything
happen to His church that will bring reproach on His name. Ever. Ever. Ever. Nothing. He allowed
it one time with Christ, His Son. But now it's to redeem us.
And He's not going to allow it again. That's over with. That's
over with. You either believe Him or we
don't. Now that's just so. Believe Him or we don't. I believe
Him. Amen. Let's stand together. Father, make us see who You are
in all Your power and all Your glory. Make us really see you. See you with our heart, with
faith. Make us see how secure, how sure,
how certain this word is to your people. Make us confident of
what you've promised, that you'll do everything you've said, And
Lord, we pray that as you've promised to call in your sons,
we pray, Lord, that you'd bless this message to their hearts
and call them in, bring them in and build up the walls of
your city. Lord, we ask this for your glory
and your honor in Christ's name. Amen.