Let's turn in our Bibles to Isaiah
chapter 57. Isaiah chapter 57. Our subject tonight is two different
portions. Two different portions. Two different
inheritances. What is the inheritance, the
lot, the destiny that you shall inherit? There are two different
portions that all men shall inherit. There is the portion of the idolater. That's the person who lives for
their belly, whose God is their belly, whose God is their will,
whose God is their works, whose God is this world, whose God
is their lust, who live for the natural, the earthy, things here
below. There is a portion that the idolaters
shall receive. And then there is a portion that
God's true people, His true people, there is an inheritance that
each believer shall receive. What will be your portion? What
will be my portion? Well, here in our text, God sent
Isaiah with the word of the Lord toward idolaters. And the Lord
said in verse 6, Isaiah 57, 6, He says, Among the smooth stones
of the stream is thy portion. Among the smooth stones of the
valley is your inheritance. They are thy lot. Even to them
hast thou poured a drink offering, thou hast offered a meat offering. In other words, to these you
worshipped. You worshipped these. You praised
these. You gloried in these. Should
I receive comfort in these? The Lord declares here that the
object of our worship shall be our inheritance. The object of
our worship shall be our inheritance. Now, first of all, let's look
at the idolaters inheritance. He says here in verse 6, among
the smooth stones of the stream is thy inheritance. They, they
are thy lot. Now God gave Israel, he's speaking
here to the children of Israel, and God gave Israel his oracles,
his temple, his high priest, his sacrifices, he gave them
all of these things. And all of those things set forth
a figure and a type, a picture, a shadow of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the one way to God. He's
the one way of salvation. And that's what everything under
the Old Testament in the law and the prophets and the ceremonies
and all of those offerings, they all pictured Christ. He gave
them all these oracles. And those that he left to themselves,
he called them out of Egypt, he redeemed them out, he brought
them out, he gave them all these oracles. And those he left to
themselves, those he did not regenerate and give his spirit
to have some discernment, those he left to themselves with all
this advantage they were given, they forsook the rock of salvation. They rejected the rock of salvation
and they worshipped the smooth stones of the stream. It means
they turned from the true and living God to strange gods. It means they turned from the
true and living God to the God that they imagined. To how they
imagined God ought to be. Not how God said He is in His
Word, but how they imagined God should be. And they turned to
the work of their own hands. God gave them a temple. He gave
them the priesthood. He gave them a mercy seat. He
gave them the altar. He gave them all these things
showing access to God through Christ, through faith in Christ
alone. But they separated themselves from the people of God, from
the temple of God, from the priests of God, from the altar of God,
the mercy seat of God. They separated themselves from
that. and they went and worshipped God where they would worship
God. They went and worshipped God together with others that
they got to go with them, and they went and worshipped God
in the places where they would worship God, in the way they
would worship God. And all of this seemed like the
right way to them. And they called this worshipping
God. When Ahab, you can read it in
scripture, when Ahab and Manasseh brought idolatry into the temple
in Jerusalem, they didn't call it worshipping Baal or Ashtoreth,
they called it worshipping the Lord of Glory. They called it
worshipping Jehovah. They never changed the name,
they just changed gods. in their hearts. And they had
a lot of other forms of worship and a lot of other places of
worship. We're going to see that as we look on further in this
chapter. But because it was all their choice and it was all their
will and their works and their way before God, it was all an
abomination. Every bit of it was an abomination.
It was wickedness before the Lord because they had rejected
God and the one way God set before them to approach Him. Look over
at Deuteronomy 32, 15. Everything I just told you, God
tells us right here. And He shows us that after He
blessed them with all these things He gave them, all this advantage
He gave them. It says in verse 15, "...but
Jeshurun..." He's speaking of Israel. Deuteronomy 32 and verse
15. He says, "...but Jeshurun waxed
fat." and kicked. He said, Thou art waxen fat. Thou art grown thick. Thou art
covered with fatness. They were lifted up in pride
at all they had, all the advantage they had. And it says, Then he
forsook God which made him, and lightly esteemed the rock of
his salvation. They provoked him to jealousy
with strange gods. With abominations provoked they
him to anger. This was all done in the name
of worship, in the name of religion. Remember, the first commandment
God gave was, you'll have no other gods before me. You won't
have any graven images, you won't make any likeness of anything
in heaven, in the earth or in the sea under the earth. You
won't bow down to them and worship them. And he says here, verse
17, they sacrificed unto devils, not to God. To gods whom they
knew not. to new gods that came newly up,
whom your fathers feared not. Of the rock that begat thee,
thou art unmindful, and hast forgotten God that formed thee.
And when the Lord saw it, he abhorred them." Do you see that? It says, when the Lord saw it,
he hated them. That's what the word abhorred
means. He hated them. because of the provoking of his
sons and of his daughters. They provoked him to hate them.
Romans 1, if you want to turn there, we have... Paul gives
us another description of this in Romans 1. What did they do? Here's what they did. Romans
1.21. He says, because that when they
knew God, they had all these These oracles to show them who
God is, and it says, when they knew God, they glorified Him
not as God. Neither were thankful, but became
vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. This is where idolatry is. It's in the vain imaginations.
It may end up being carved out into an image. It may end up
being carved out into a stock or a stone or something like
that. But regardless, if it is or not, it's carved out in imagination. That's where the idolatry starts.
And it says, And their foolish heart was darkened, professing
themselves to be wise. They became fools and changed
the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to
corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping
things." And so God declares here in our text, He says, now
that's the object of your worship. You've chosen this valley, not
the temple. You've chosen division, that's
what the word smooth means, your portion, your part, and not the
Lord's part. You've chosen the smooth stones
of the stream rather than the rock of salvation. You've even
poured out a drink offering to them and a meat offering to them.
And God says, because that's the object of your worship, there's
your inheritance. Verse 6, He says, Among the smooth
stones of the streams thou portioned, they, they are thy lot. And here's
why. Even to them hast thou poured
a drink offering, thou hast offered a meat offering to them. The
drink offering and the meat offering. It's just what it sounds like.
It was a food offering. It was an offering of food. That's
what it was. Food's life. You eat food, you
live. Food is life. And it was a ceremony
God gave in the law to thank God for giving them life. Everything they brought was something
God had made to grow out of the earth and provided them food
with. Drink and meat. Drink and bread. Drink and flour. That's what it was. Oil and flour.
And it pictured Christ who is the bread from heaven. That's
what this pictures. And by his broken body, by his
shed blood, his people have remission of sins. Our sins are put away
and we have forgiveness of sins. That's what we show when we take
the bread and the wine. We're showing his broken body
and his shed blood. And so the idolater, though,
is one who merely imitates it. He goes through the form of thanking
God and worshiping God. That's what they did. But in
his heart, he's not thanking God and he's not worshiping God.
In his heart, he's thanking his idol God and he's worshiping
his idol God. That's the object of their worship,
he said. Let me try to illustrate this,
if I can, by showing you what the Old Covenant was. Under that
Old Covenant, after God said, worship no graven images, nothing
in likeness of heaven or earth or in the sea, then God He gave
images to worship. He gave an altar. He gave mercy
seat. He gave a temple. He gave all
these things. sacrifices of lambs and bulls
and goats and those things. Those were to show us Christ,
the figures and types of Christ. Now we don't need those things
and we're not to worship with any of those things because,
as the Hebrew writer said, we've got that Old Testament picture,
but now the substance of it, Christ, has come. He fulfilled
all those pictures, all those types. Christ has come and He's
the very image that all those things pictured. So now we don't
need any images to help us anymore because we've got God's written
word telling us all about those and in those we see pictures
and types of Christ and we look at Christ. We lay hold of the
image himself through faith. But even then, the true believer
who was worshipping in those ways, he was still worshipping
God through faith in Christ. The true believer was, we saw
that last time, all Old Testament believers worship God through
faith in Christ. You remember Jacob, he built
an altar of stones. This was before God even gave
that law, but he built an altar of stones, built them up out
there in the wilderness and he worshipped God. But he wasn't
worshipping the altar of stones, he was worshipping God because
he knew something of the fact that we must come to God through
an altar. And Hebrews said, our altar is
Christ. That's who the altar pictured.
And Jacob knew something of that because he had the Spirit of
God in his heart. But the man who doesn't have the Spirit of
God in his heart, who lived in that day, he sees a man build
an altar of stone and worship God through it. And he says,
that's how you worship God. I'll build me an altar of stone.
And I'll worship God. I'll make my offerings on this
altar of stone. But you see, the difference between
the two is one of them has the Spirit of God teaching him in
his heart and he's worshipping God coming through Christ pictured
in that altar. The other one is worshipping
that altar. Worshipping the fact he built
up those stones. Worshipping his giving of his
offerings on that altar. Worshipping his meat offerings
and his drink offerings on that altar. Now, let's bring it to today.
You have two people who go through a form of true worship. True
worship. You got two people. They come
side by side. They come to the building. They
each sing. They each bow their heads to
pray. They each read the Bible. They
each hear the sermon preached. But there's one of them who has
the Spirit of God in his heart, and through all those means,
he's worshipping the Lord Jesus Christ. God's given him a heart
of worship so that he can approach unto God in Christ and commune
with God and worship God and praise God and glory in God.
That's what he's doing. The other one is worshipping
his coming to the church building. He's glorying in the fact that
he was singing, and that he said some prayer, and that he read
a scripture, and that he heard a sermon preached. He's glorying
in the form. He's worshiping the form while
the others worship in Christ through all of those means. There are some who justly condemn
the fact that men use images. There are those in our day who
still use images. And you can look here. Just like
they didn't do away with the meat offering, even though they
were in a valley somewhere and were worshiping God in the temple.
They didn't do away with the meat offering. They kept some
of that. And they kept some of these things
they learned from God. There's men today who worship
crucifixes. They use paintings. They even say the bread and the
wine actually turns into the body and blood of Christ. And
there are some who would condemn all of that and justly so. They
would never have an idol. They would never have any of
those things. And that's right. They shouldn't. And yet, at the
same time, they unjustly are worshipping the work of their
own hands. Claiming that they can come to God when they will.
claiming that they can make themselves righteous by their works under
the law, claiming they can make themselves holy, sanctifying
themselves, claiming that they can do all of these things so
that when they thank God for life, when they thank their God for
what He's given them, They're not thanking God for Christ,
the bread from heaven, in whom is all their salvation, in whom
they're resting, turned from all their works and looking at
any of their works. In their heart, whether they
know it or not, they're thanking their own hand. They're thinking
that those stones they set up, they're thinking that they have
life because they came to the church building. They went through
the ceremony and they did these things and that things and didn't
do the other thing. They're thinking themselves that
they have life. Do you see that? That's what,
that's what, it's like the, remember the publican and the Pharisee.
The publican stood there and he, thank God, Lord I thank you. I'm not like these other I tithe
and I give and I'm not like that publican standing there. And the publican standing there
was really worshipping God. He was on his face, bowed before
God and on his face and his heart and he was saying, Lord have
mercy on me. Be the propitiation for me. Put
away my sin. Bring me to God's presence. Be
my advocate with God." And that's what he's saying here. These
were in the valley worshiping the work of their hands. And
God said, should I receive comfort in these? Should I receive comfort
in these vain wheel workers, in their works and in their vain
gods? No. Should I receive satisfaction
to my justice by their offerings and their meat offerings and
their vain gods? He says, no. Should I receive
any satisfaction or turn away from pouring out my wrath on
them? No. No. And so the object of their
inheritance is the work of their hand. Their inheritance is their
vain God. Their inheritance is wrath from
God because that's what they earned, that's what they sought
after by continuing in their own works and their own way.
Do you get that? Whatever you... God's going to
give us what we want. If He leaves us to ourselves,
we're going to want our way And our will and our works to be
exalted. And God's going to exalt them
and bring them, raise them up, every one of them, the ones that
we hid from everybody. He's going to bring them all
up and bring them all out and all into the light. And He's
going to put them right beside Christ Jesus the righteous. And
we'll have to measure up to Christ. And no man will. No man will. But now look there secondly.
What's the object of the believer's worship? Who's the object of
our worship? We worship the rock of salvation.
Turn over to Isaiah 28 and look at verse 16. Now that's where we were, that's
where God found us, was right there worshipping our belly,
worshipping the world, worshipping our hands, worshipping our will
and our works. It doesn't matter if you're in religion or out
of religion. All men come into this world worshipping themselves,
idolaters by nature. That's where God found all of
us. We're going to see later in Isaiah 57, he says, I drew
him out and saved him. I brought him out and saved him.
Look here, and here's what he showed us. Isaiah 28, 16. He says, Behold, I lay in Zion
for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious cornerstone,
a sure foundation, and he that believeth shall not make haze.
Who laid this foundation? The Lord God laid this foundation.
This stone we worship is one that God the Father chose. He
chose His Son in eternity to come and save His people and
glorify Him. He chose His Son and sent Him
forth. He's glorified in His Son. He
saved His people in His Son. And now He's glorified His Son
and set Him at His right hand. He set this stone that we worship
in Zion. He set Christ our stone in the
midst of His church. He sets Him in our hearts. And
He sets Him at His own right hand. And then look, The Lord
Jesus is a tried stone. Now you think about this. Can
Christ be counted on? He was tried by God. All-seeing,
all-knowing, holy, righteous God of heaven and earth. He was
tried by God. When He walked this earth as
the servant of God, He was tried by God. He was tried under the
law of God. That law that requires you to
be holy and righteous, holy in your heart and righteous in your
deeds. He was tried by Satan. tempted over and over and over,
tried by Satan. He was tried by men. And then
at last, he was brought to that cruel cross when God forsook
him, and men forsook him, and all hell unleashed on him. And
he was tried on that cruel cross. And through all of this trying,
Christ was found faithful and true. He was found holy and righteous. Nothing could be found in Him
personally of His own accord that He brought forth but righteousness
and holiness. Nothing. Yeah, He can be counted
on. This is a tried stone, a proven
stone. And then look, therefore the
Lord Jesus is our precious cornerstone, our sure foundation. The wisdom
and power of God is the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the wisdom
and power by which God... The cornerstone is that cornerstone
that holds the whole building together. And He's the sure foundation
on which the whole house of God is built. That means Christ is
the wisdom and the power by which God put away sin of all His people
and made all His people perfect so that God can receive us. And
He makes His Son to be wisdom unto us. He makes us behold that
Christ is the precious cornerstone, the sure foundation, the wisdom
of God. Christ is the righteousness of
God. He is God... The righteousness
of God Himself is the Lord Jesus Christ. When He walked this earth,
it was natural for Him to do what the law said Because as
it is for you and I to do what it says not to do. Because He's
righteousness. It's just natural for Him to
do it. There was no inclination or thought to do otherwise because
He's righteousness. And then He went to the cross
and put away the sin of His people so that now He's made us righteousness
by what He's done. And God makes Him righteousness
to us. Christ is holiness. He was born
of the Virgin, holy, sinless, harmless, undefiled, separate
from sinners. That's how come every thought
of His heart was to please God, and everything He did pleased
God. Because He's holiness. He's the very holiness of God.
And God makes Him to us holiness. He makes Christ our sanctification. When Christ is formed in us,
that's when you behold all these things in Christ Jesus. And your
heart is for God and for Christ, for His glory, not your own,
when Christ is made sanctification to you. And that's when He shows
you, too, that Christ is our redemption, because He came and
redeemed us from that curse we were under. He brought us completely
out of that darkness, out of that curse, out of that power
of Satan, and delivered us from it. He's redeemed us. He's purchased
us, and we belong to Him. He's the kinsman redeemer. He's
the one who's purchased us. And He shows you that. He makes
Christ unto you redemption. When he does that, brethren,
you see that God's house, His church, His people, you in particular,
who are His house, the spiritual house, it's what that old tabernacle
and temple pictured. It's that spiritual house built
up, built up. Just like that tabernacle was
nothing to look at on the outside, Christ had nothing about Him
on the outside that appeared beautiful to men, but through
and through He was holy and righteous, just like on the inside of that
tabernacle there was gold and furnishings and beautiful tapestries
and things in there. And that's what He makes His
people. To look at you outwardly in your flesh, and there's nothing
about us that's beautiful, but inwardly He's made His people
holy so that we lay hold of Christ who's our only righteousness.
So when he does this, he makes you see the whole house is built
up, a spiritual house, and it's on a precious cornerstone that's
holding the whole house together. Me, you, and every other believer
in this world. and in heaven, and holding us
together on a sure foundation that can't be moved. That's who
we worship. That's who we worship. And he
says this in verse 16, Isaiah 28, 16. He says, And he that
believeth shall not make haste. Believers are waiting on Christ.
We wait on Christ in everything. We're not going to... He's finished
the work of redemption. And we know He gathered us in
the right time, in His time, when He would. And we know He's
going to do the same for all His people. So we don't make
haste. We don't get in a hurry. We wait on the Lord. And we don't
make haste to lay any other foundation. We got one foundation. We don't
run after strange gods. We don't separate ourselves from
God's place where He set His name and established His name
like He did in our text. He had established His name in
a place. He said right there in that temple is where I'll
meet with you. That's Christ. We don't try to meet with God
anywhere else but in Christ. And by him establishing his name
there, he said, this is where you come to worship God. God's
established his name in places around this world where he's
got his gospel being preached where Christ is being preached
in the gospel and where Christ is preaching to his people. And
he says, there is where I've established you and set you and
gathered you and we're not hasty to separate ourselves, to be
offended or to offend others because no matter what happens
in this world, no matter what's going on in this world, we can
wait on the Lord because we know this, nothing is worth severing
myself and my family and my brethren from hearing this gospel preached.
Nothing. Nothing is. Well, I got to eat
crow, eat the whole crow, beak feet and all, eat it all and
get back under the sound of the gospel. Whatever you have to
do, I'm going to have to beg forgiveness. Get on your hands
and knees and beg forgiveness. Whatever it is, nothing is worth
separating from the house of God and the people of God. You
don't want to be found in that valley where those folks were.
You don't want to be found there, separated and divided. And God's
given us life, bread from heaven. And Christ is our... He's our
bread from heaven. And so when we come to God and
offer our meat offering and our drink offering, we come to God
thanking God for life that is in Christ Jesus. And we do it
through Christ Jesus and we're offering to God nothing but Christ
Jesus. Because He's our meat. He's our
bread. He's our life. And God receives
comfort, satisfaction toward us in Christ Jesus. He said of
those that were in their vain, really, shall I receive comfort
in these? But He receives comfort toward us, toward Christ, because
we're one in Christ. He's reconciled us and made us
one in Christ. He's satisfied in Christ, so
He receives us in Christ. And so, this is the object of
our worship, Christ. So, guess what? We have an inheritance. Do you know who we have that
inheritance in? Ephesians 1.11 says, In whom? In Christ. Also, we have obtained an inheritance
being predestinated according to the purpose of Him who works
all things after the counsel of His own will. So, God promises
us that the object of our worship shall be our inheritance. Now,
go with me back to Psalm 16 and verse 5. The object of our worship,
which is Christ, shall be our inheritance. Psalm 16, verse
5. Now this is Christ speaking right
here in this psalm. Listen to this. Psalm 16, verse
5. This is Christ speaking. This
is that psalm where He said, My goodness doesn't extend to
thee, O Lord, it extends to those in the earth, to my people in
the earth. And He says here in verse 5,
The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance. God is my inheritance. This is Christ as the servant
of God, as the high priest of God. The Lord is the portion
of my inheritance and of my cup. Thou maintainest my lot. And
if you want to see what the portion of my cup means, look over there
at... Let's see here. Look over there
at Psalm 23.5. Thou preparest a table before
me in the presence of mine enemies. Thou anointest my head with oil,
and my cup runs over." It means God is doing everything for us
in this world. Now, Christ is praying there
as the High Priest. Now, do you remember Aaron the
High Priest? Aaron the High Priest was a picture of Christ. And
over in Numbers 18-20, you can find that the Lord told Aaron,
you don't have any inheritance among the children of Israel.
You don't have any inheritance in the land. You don't have any
inheritance in the valley below. He says, because I'm your inheritance. God told Aaron, I'm your inheritance.
And Aaron's a picture of Christ, our high priest. And that's what
Christ said there in that Psalm. God's my inheritance. God didn't
come to have any of this earth, any of this earth's riches, anything
in this earth. God is his inheritance. God is
in his inheritance. And then the Lord told those
priests that served under Aaron, the Levites, he told them in
Numbers, in Deuteronomy 18, he told them, you don't have any
inheritance in the land either because the Lord God is your
inheritance. Now there you have a picture
of our high priest and you have a picture of us who are made
priests in our high priest. We don't have any inheritance.
And how sad this is, brethren. Those who worship their own way
and their own will and their own works and their belly and
all the things of this world, they don't have any inheritance
in heaven. They don't have any inheritance
in God. They don't have any inheritance in Christ. They only have an
inheritance in the stones and their doings and in this earth
below. And yet the believer, what a blessing. We don't have
any inheritance in these things below or in the works of our
hands or in ourselves. Our inheritance is in heaven,
in God, in Christ alone. That's where our inheritance
is. In fact, we're so one with God and so united with Him in
Christ, the scripture says the Lord's portion, His inheritance
is His people. Jacob is the lot of His inheritance. He's our inheritance and we're
His inheritance. Now, He's the object of our worship
and He's our inheritance. But there's some differences,
some other differences. Let me show you these very quickly
and we'll move on. When He says there, they worship
the smooth stones of the stream. Have you ever been out and you
get to a stream and there's that stone just underneath the water
and you can see it, it's smooth and it looks like a good place
to step to get across that stream. And you step on it and it's as
slippery as it can be and your feet go right out front and you
hit your back. Look at Jeremiah 23.11. The Lord said that's going
to be your inheritance. That's what He told the people
that worship in themselves. He's telling them, those that
worship the work of their hands shall inherit slippery paths
in this life. Look at Jeremiah 23, 11. He said, both prophet and priest
are profane. Yea, in my house have I found
their wickedness, saith the Lord. Wherefore, the Lord says, their
way shall be unto them as slippery
ways in the darkness. They shall be driven on and fall
therein, for I will bring evil upon them, even the year of their
visitation, saith the Lord." Now, how does he do that? What's
it look like? Well, in Romans 1, after he said they turned
from him, he said, God gave them up to uncleanness through the
lusts of their own hearts to dishonor their own bodies between
themselves. who changed the truth of God
into a lie and worshipped and served the creature more than
the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. It looks like what you
see in the world. Men dishonoring their bodies
between themselves, walking in the lusts of their flesh. You
can't deny God when you look around you because you see the
judgment of God. You see God putting men in slippery
paths who worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator.
But the believer's inheritance is a sure path. Listen, I give
you these scriptures, you can look them up at home. Psalm 40
verse 2 says this, He brought me up out of the horrible pit,
out of the miry clay, and He set my feet upon a rock and established
my goings. He said in Psalm 27 5, In the
time of trouble He shall hide me in His pavilion. In the secret
of His tabernacle shall He hide me, He shall set me upon a rock. The Lord, when He said, I laid
in Zion a foundation, He said this, He said to those in Israel,
you say you've made a covenant with death and hell. He said,
I'm going to lay in Zion a stone, and I'm going to send forth the
floods of judgment. I'm going to lay judgment to
the line and righteousness to the plummet. And He says, and
I'm going to sweep away all the refuge of lies. Anybody that's
not in that pavilion, anybody that's not in that rock, on that
foundation, they will be swept away. And Christ came along,
the stone, and he spoke, preached on that Sermon on the Mount,
and then he gave his own word, in his own words, he gave us
a commentary on what the Lord said over there in Isaiah 28.
He said, the man who hears my words and does what I say gets
in Christ, falls at Christ's feet, worships Christ, believes
on Christ, and rests in Christ. He said, I liken that man to
a man who built his house on a rock. And when the floods came
and the winds blew, it didn't fall because it was built on
a rock. That's what he's telling us,
brethren. He's the rock. And anybody that's not founded
on him is in slippery paths. And this is something else. He
told to them, he said, They are thy lot. They are thy lot. You've traded a sure thing. He's
telling those in Israel that went after their way. You traded
a sure thing. For chance. This is your lot. Now you have to look to your
gods to maintain your way. The works of your hands to maintain
your way. Your wisdom to maintain your
way. Your works to maintain your way. Do you want that to be your
lot? I don't. I don't. Here is the
lot of God's people. He said, Thou maintainest my
lot. God maintains our lot. He said
in Isaiah 54, no weapon that's formed against you shall prosper.
He says, every tongue that's going to rise against you in
judgment shall be condemned. This is the heritage, the inheritance
of the servants of the Lord and their righteousness is of me.
Whenever he maintains our lot, it means this. Whenever He divided
the sons of Adam, the scripture says, it says, He divided their
land unto them and set the bounds of their habitation according
to the number of the children of Israel. Now you think about
what that means, brethren. Years and years, generations
and generations before God ever said anything at all to Israel
about the promised land. At the Tower of Babel, when God
divided the nations, He didn't just let men run out and just
take all the land they wanted, wherever they wanted, and take
it from them. He divided them out there into
the land of Canaan. That was the promised land that He was
going to promise to Israel years later. But He didn't let them
just go out there and grab whatever they wanted. He set the bounds
of where they could habitate, where they could live. So that
every nation had their bounds where they lived. So that all,
and he did it according to the number of the children of Israel.
So that all those years later when he brought Israel to the
land of Canaan, these nations, these different nations had been
taking care of that land. It had plenty of grapes and plenty
of bread and plenty of everything in it because these nations had
been taking care of it. And so he just ran them out,
and in came the Lord's people, the children of Israel, and it
was just the right amount of land, and he gave it to each
of the tribes individually, so they all had just the right amount
of land. Here's the lesson in that. Long
before God ever came and told us anything about the gospel,
God had already maintained our lot by putting us in Christ before
the foundation of the world so that we give thanks unto God
who's made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints
and light. Colossians 1 is talking about how God made us fit to
enter in Christ from the foundation of the world because He chose
Him to be the preeminent Son. And not only that, Christ has
gone there. Look at 1 Peter 1. Christ has gone there now. And
because of what He's accomplished on the cross, look at this. He's maintaining our lot, our
inheritance, our portion. He maintains it. 1 Peter 1.3
says, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
which according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to
a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
to an inheritance. incorruptible, undefiled, that
fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you who are kept by
the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed
in the last time." Just like He separated that land and divided
it according to the number of Israel, He has maintained our
lot in glory where Christ is so that when He brings us there,
there'll be just the right place for every one of His people and
not any of them will do without or be lost or be left out. He's maintaining it for us. It's
reserved for us. And He's keeping us in His life
so He'll bring us to it. That's our inheritance, brethren.
It sure is different from the idolater's inheritance, isn't
it? Well, there's one more thing, one more difference. And I'll
show you this. The idolater is going to inherit
the fierce wrath of God's judgment. When he's talking there about
that valley, the smooth stones of the stream, it means of the
valley, it sounds a lot like, he says, this is your inheritance.
And it sounds like the valley of Jehoshaphat. And in Joel 3.12,
the Lord said this, Let the heathen be awakened, and come up to the
valley of Jehoshaphat. For there will I sit to judge
all the heathen round about." Now, here's what it don't mean.
It does not mean God's going to bring all the heathens to
some valley somewhere and there He's going to sit and judge them.
It's a symbolical of the judgment of God. But here's what it does
mean. In that valley, where that stream is, where those smooth
stones are, in that place that you chose, in that place where
you worshipped the will of your hands, in that place where you
worshipped your way and your works, right there is where God
is going to judge you. Right there, in that valley.
And when he does, it won't be good. Look here back in our text,
Isaiah 57, look at verse 13. When you stand there in that
day, trusting in you, listen to me now carefully, you're going
to have to be your own advocate, you're going to have to stand
in your own righteousness, you're going to have to stand there
interceding for yourself to the all-knowing, holy, and righteous
God. I know we blame everybody and
everything else for everything we do. Nothing is our fault in
this world. Nothing is our fault. That's
what you hear constantly every day. Somebody, some kid's having
a problem, it's cause, I don't want to, it's just, it's always
somebody else's fault for everything. And that day, it won't be anybody's
fault but our own. We're going to stand before God
and He's going to say, you're the only one to blame. Now look at what
he says, verse 13. When thou criest, let thy companies
deliver thee. Let those gods you worshipped
and the work of your hand, let them deliver you. But the wind,
the wind shall carry them all away. Vanity shall take them. But he that putteth his trust
in me shall possess the land and inherit my holy land. Look at Matthew 25 will be done. You see our inheritance is different
in the day of judgment. We are not going to inherit the
judgment of God's wrath. In Christ we are going to inherit
the judgment of God's approval. Because we have the righteousness
God demands. We have the holiness God demands.
We have Christ Jesus our Lord. And here is what God is going
to do in that day. Matthew 25, 32. Before him shall be gathered
all nations, just like he gathered the heathen to the valley of
Jehoshaphat. Before him shall be gathered
all nations, he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd
divides his sheep from the goats. And he shall set the sheep on
his right hand, but the goats on the left. Then shall the king
say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father,
inherit, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation
of the world. Those are two very different
portions, two very different lots, two very different inheritances. I pray God now make you come
out of that valley, come out from worshiping the work of your
hands your will and your way and make you come to Christ.
Because whatever the object of your worship is, that's what
you're going to inherit. Whatever the object of your worship
is. I pray you make Christ the object of your heart. Amen. All right, Eric.