Isaiah 44 and verse 24. Thus saith the Lord, thy Redeemer, and He that formed thee from
the womb, I am the Lord that maketh all. You know, when you're a student,
you prepare for the upcoming exam that's coming. You listen
to the teacher teach. You take down the notes that
the teacher teaches and you go home and you study and you think
about what the teacher has taught you. And when it's time for the
big test to come, the big exam to come, you get somebody a lot
of times to ask you all the questions that's going to be on the test.
And they'll sit there and ask you, one after another, all the
questions. And you answer the questions. You can sit there
and answer them. You miss a few now and then,
but you keep going over them and over them, and you answer
all the questions. Get yourself to where you feel
good and prepared to take that test. And then the test day comes. You ever had this happen? goes down on your desk, you turn
it over, and you start reading those questions. And there's
not a question on that piece of paper that looks like the
questions that you studied for. You began to look at those questions
and you think, this is not worded like anything like what I studied.
This doesn't look like what I studied at all. So you just fill in what
you think is the answer. You write down what to you seemed
like the best answer. And you get back the test after
the teacher graded it. And you didn't get it right.
Failed it. Failed the test. What happened? You knew all the questions when
you were studying, all the answers to the questions when you were
studying. And then you got there and started looking at those
questions on that test, and you didn't know answer one. What
happened? You had the answers in your head,
but you didn't have the answers in your heart. What do you mean
by that? When we have the answers in our
head, we can answer as long as the question is worded exactly
the way we learned it in the letter. Exact words. When we
have the answer in our heart, the question can be worded in
all kind of various ways. And we still know the answer
because we know it in our heart. We've learned it in spirit. We know it. You let the question
be worded. Is man depraved? And the man
can hear that word, depraved. Yep, yep, he's depraved. Is God sovereign? Here's that
word sovereign. I know that word. Yep. God's
sovereign. He's sovereign. Is salvation
of the Lord? We hear that word. Salvation
is of the Lord. I've read that. That's in Jonah.
Jonah said that. Salvation is of the Lord. Yep.
That's right. I know that. Salvation is of
the Lord. Redemption. He hath obtained
eternal redemption. Is redemption obtained, accomplished
by Christ Jesus through His blood and His righteousness? I read
it. Redemption. It's accomplished by Him. I know
it is. Forgiveness. By Him we have forgiveness of
sins. Did He put away sins? He hath
put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. I see it. I know.
Yep. He did that. Is salvation by grace alone,
through faith alone? Ah, recognize those words. Grace,
faith alone. Yep. Salvation is by entirely
relying upon God only. On Him only. That's faith. Relying
on God only to do the saving. Heard it. Invincibly, irresistibly
call his child? Does he teach his child? Does
he correct his child? Does he keep his child? Does
he preserve his people? Irresistible, invincible. I know
that word. I recognize that word. Yep. Yep. That's right. I know that's true. But then God gives the exam in
the form of his providence, everyday life. right here where we live
and move and have our being. And it comes in the form of an
assembly that he's drawn together that doesn't have any form about
it or any comeliness about it that would make you look upon
it and desire to be a part of it. It comes in the form of daily
affairs that have to be worked out among his people. It comes
in the form of hard times or prosperity. It comes in the form
of somebody coming along and ever so craftily mingling law
and grace, works and grace. And we find ourselves failing
the exam miserably. Failing it miserably. What does
the teacher do? When you fail the test in school,
what does the teacher do? Before you go any further, the
teacher says, all right, we got a review. We got to go back and
go over this again and get these questions answered. Not just
in our head, but in our heart. We got to learn these things,
got to go back and review them. That's what the Lord's doing
with his child. The Lord's teaching his children, and then he's testing
us. And then he teaches us again
and he tests us and we keep finding out over and over that we keep
failing miserably. We won't. We won't. We want to know and we want to
be sure we want to rest and we think we've got it and then here
comes another test and we find out. I don't have it. I don't have it. Nearly like
I want to have it and like I need to have. I just don't have the
answer. I don't have it. But the Lord's the teacher. He's
the teacher. And he's gonna see to it that
he uses everything that he has at his disposal and everything
is at his disposal. And he keeps using everything
he has to teach us. Make sure we get done lesson
in the heart. What is the lesson? What is it? What's the truth? What is the
gospel? He keeps teaching us over and over. The message is
this. God is our salvation. God is our salvation. He's manifest
His holy character. He's manifest His holy name.
He's manifest His righteousness. He's declared it all to us through
the medium of the second person of the Trinity, His own, God
the Son coming forth in human flesh and showing us so we can
see and understand and believe. You can't see the sun when the
sun's out shining bright. You can't look at it and see
it directly, but you should let it shine through a cloud and
you can see it. You can see it then. God's manifest who He is
in the God-man, our mediator, so we can see who He is and know
who He is. And He's taught us, and He is
that God. He is that salvation. He is our salvation. And He calls
us together, and He knits us together, teaching us constantly
He is our salvation. And through all these means that
He's using and things that His church has to go through, He's
teaching us He is our salvation. And He does that so that we'll
keep on continually declaring our testimony, which you just
read, Scott. And through that testimony, that testimony is
the gospel. I'm telling you tonight what
I know. What I know, I know God is my salvation. He is our salvation. And we keep telling each other
that, reminding each other that, and through his word, he keeps
us together, keeps us growing, keeps teaching us, and he saves
other sheep. Calls them out. Calls them out. And that's the purpose for which
he's assembled us in this earth. very purpose. And anytime we
take our eye off of Him, off His Son, He's purposed this,
that every eye in this earth, of every sinner that He's chosen
and redeemed and called by His grace, He's purposed and works
everything together to make certain that the eye of his child is
on his son, because that's who God the Father is pleased for
our eye to be upon, his son. He's pleased for every word that
goes forth from the lighthouse that there be light from that
house, light going out from that house. Man, what good would a
lighthouse be to ships traveling on treacherous waters if there
was no light going forth out of it? The light is the gospel
of our Christ and Him crucified, the Lord's salvation. And He's
going to see to it that every word is to glorify Him. And that
everything He's drawing His people to do is not to point you and
me to us, but to Him. And whenever we turn our eye
from Him, He's going to turn His child back to His Son. He's
going to do that. He will effectually turn us back. And we find it to be, when He
does it over and over, we find it to be exactly like the Lord
Jesus Christ told us it would be. In me, you shall have peace.
When faith is just laid on Him, walking Right behind Him, looking
right at Him, we find peace. We have peace. But when we turn away from Him,
we find exactly as He said, in this world, tribulation. That's all you're going to have.
That's all you're going to have. You're never going to get to
a place in the world at all. Look into the world. You're never
going to come to a place in this world. If you're a child of God,
I promise you this. Now, if you're not a child of
God, it's otherwise. But if you're a child of God,
I promise you this, you're never, ever gonna come to a place in
this life with anything in this life or anything of this world,
anything of your own hand, to where you stop and say, okay,
now I can just put my trust right here and my confidence right
here and rest right here. That'll never happen. It will
never happen. I've heard men to say this to
me over and over all my life. And I've had I've had men tell
me this the past five years over and over clay. It does not get
any easier. It won't. It won't. If it did, we rest easy. In the easiness of this life
and his works and his hand. We just don't, it's not going
to. God's not going to bring us to a place of ease and then, then do something with us. Just
not. We're going to find our peace
one place in him, resting in him, looking at him, trusting
him, relying entirely upon him. Then we'll have peace. That's
where we'll have peace. Well, I've titled this message,
Review After the Exam. Review After the Exam. Have you
ever noticed how many questions the Lord God asks throughout
the book of Isaiah? The teacher doesn't ask questions
because the teacher doesn't know the answer, do they? The teacher
asks questions so you can learn the answer to the question. Well,
that's the same with the Lord God. And all of these questions,
if you went through and you just read the questions, just read
through Isaiah until you found the question, and read the things
he says right before the question, right after the question, he
answers the question. You'll have the gospel. You'll
have the truth. And it can be divided, all these
questions can be divided into two headings, two questions,
or maybe two answers to two questions. They can all be divided into
two, and this will be our headings tonight. The first question is,
what are you? And the answer to that is grass. Nothing. No strength, no might,
no power, no wisdom. Nothing. The second heading to
all these questions is this. Who's God? Who's the Savior? Who's Christ? And the answer
is salvation. All provision. Salvation. Let's go back. Let's review a
few questions concerning you and I, the sinner. We've got
to go back and review. That's what the gospel is. Here's
the first question the Lord God asked through Isaiah. Verse 5. Isaiah 1-5. Why should you be
stricken anymore? Do you ever have that question come
into your mind when you're trying to correct your child? Why, why should I strike you
anymore? Why should I correct you anymore? You will revolt more and more.
The whole head is sick and the whole heart is faint. You know
that's true of this whole world. That's true of sinners in this
world. But that's true of you and me who believe God. Why should
God correct us anymore? Our whole head and our whole
hearts faint from the top of the head to the sole of their
foot. In our flesh dwells no good thing. We're going to revolt
again. We're going to turn away from
God again. Why should He correct us again?
Verse 9, He says, Except the Lord of hosts had left us a very
small remnant. We'd been as Solomon as Gomorrah. He keeps correcting His child
because He's His child. Because He chose him and everlastingly
loved him and put you in Christ. That's why He keeps on and won't
stop. You know that's why you sitting
here, that's why our mothers and fathers corrected us in this
earth. Because we were their children.
That's why your mothers and fathers correct you in this earth because
you're their children. That's why God's correcting us, believe
it, because we're His child, chosen, loved. Look at verse
11. To what purpose is the multitude
of your sacrifices unto me? You know, they came, he says
there, they came with burnt offerings of rams, they came with the fat
of fed beasts, they came with the blood of bullocks and of
lambs and of he goats, they came into his house, they came in
and observed the days and the new moons and the sabbaths, everything
God said to do. They did it. God said, why are
you doing it? Why are you doing it? Why do
you come to this place? When we come to hear God's Word,
are we giving something to God or is God giving something to
us? Whenever we give our time, give
our money, give our lives. We're giving something to God
or is God giving something to us? We don't give anything to
God. We don't give anything to God.
All provision, all abundance, all grace comes to us from God. He's righteousness. He imputes
the righteousness of his son to his child. His holiness, He
creates us anew by His Spirit with a new heart. And the means
that He's using is not us giving something to God, it's God giving
something to us. A gift of blind, did you know
that? Now you listen to this very carefully. A gift will blind. We provide for one another. This
church, we provide for one another here and we give to each other.
Give to each other, the church would give to help each other
here. But be sure to understand this. If we think it comes from a man,
we're gonna find ourselves following man. That's so, in the ear. Man will get our ear. We'll follow him in our pocketbook.
Follow him. He'll put something in our pocket. We'll think, ah. And we'll follow
him in our mirror. That was the problem that was
happening in Isaiah's day. They said, we're replenished
from these. We're replenished from the Philistine. Well, let's
not do anything to offend them. They've given us so much. Let's try to make this thing
palatable to them and to everybody here. Better to offend them than
to offend God. A gift's blinding. The gifts
that God gives, spiritual, temporal, he's gonna use means he's gonna
use our fellow brethren. He's gonna use his church in
this earth, and I'm so thankful he does. I'm so thankful he does. We'll find out, we'll find that
out. We really will find that out as we believe God. We'll find that out. But make
sure we know this, it's God giving the gift, spiritually and temporally. It's God making all the provision.
It's God doing it. I used to think that when the
Scripture talked about mountains, I used to think in the Scripture
that it was talking, it was the mountains were representing those
great obstacles that we've got to climb, you know, to get over,
those hurdles we got to get over. You know what? The mountains
represent more than anything in the Scriptures. The mountains
in the Scriptures represent our haughtiness of thinking that
we have sufficiency by what we can see. He said, I'm going to
bring down the mountains. Bring down the mountains. We
ought to be as afraid of the mountain heights of self-sufficiency
as we are of the valleys of self-doubt. You know why? Because in our
fleshly nature, it's our nature to choose the crooked ways to
try to overcome both of them. And we find ourselves in very
rough places. Very rough places. This is what
the wise man prayed in Proverbs. Proverbs 30, verse 8. In fact,
two books there. In Proverbs 38, he said this. Remove... Proverbs 38. This was his prayer. Remove far from me vanity and
lies. Give me neither poverty nor riches. Feed me with food convenient
for me. Lest I be full, lest I get on
a mountain and deny thee and say, who's the Lord? Or lest
I be poor and still and take the name of my God in vain. That's
exactly what the Lord has done for every individual believer
that he's called. That's exactly what he's done.
That's exactly what he's done. In our heart, that's exactly
what he's done. That's exactly what the Lord does when he assembles
his church. Do you see that brethren? We
don't have, we're not rich. And we're not poor. We've got everything. We've got
food convenient for us. Food for us. Right now. That's what we have. Well, back
at Isaiah 2. I'll go along. This is going
to finish this first heading. Isaiah 2, verse 22. Look at the
question now. We've got to get this answer
to this question. Cease ye from man whose breath
is in his nostrils, for wherein is he to be accounted of? Where is he to be accounted of?
Look over at Isaiah 40. Isaiah 40. From Isaiah 1 all
the way to Isaiah 40, it's woe. It's just woe. It's the Lord
saying, I am completely taken away. Everything from the nation,
I'm taking it away. And Isaiah 40 opens up with,
now go comfort my people and tell them the warfare is accomplished.
It's done. It's done. It's already accomplished. It's done. And the voice said,
Cry, verse 6. And he said, What shall I cry?
And he said, Tell of all flesh is grass, and all the goodliness
thereof is as the flower of the field. The grass withereth, the
flower fadeth, because the Spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it.
Surely the people is grass. The grass withereth, the flower
fadeth, but the word of our God shall stand forever. This is the message. That's the
first thing all these questions address is all flesh is grass. All flesh is grass. Here's the
second heading. Let's review a few questions
concerning who God is. A few questions concerning Christ
our Savior. Look right there at Isaiah 40
verse 12. Now we're talking about Christ.
We're talking about that One who came in human flesh. Who is He? Who is He? Here's the question, verse 12.
Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and
meted out heaven with a span, and comprehended the dust of
the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and
the hills in a balance? Who hath directed the Spirit
of the Lord, or being his counselor, hath taught him? With whom took
he counsel, and who instructed him, and taught him in the path
of judgment? taught him knowledge, showed
to him the way of understanding. Who did any of that? Look down
at verse 28. Here's the question. Hast thou
not known? Hast thou not known? Hast thou
not heard that the everlasting God, the Lord The Creator of
the ends of the earth fainteth not, neither is weary. There's no searching of His understanding. He doesn't faint, but here's
what He does. Verse 29, He gives power. Does He give power to everybody?
No, He doesn't. Who does He give power to? To
the faint. He doesn't think, but he gives
power to those who don't have any. That's who he gives power
to, those who don't have any power. To them that have a little might,
to them that have just a little bit that they could mingle together
with his might and say, well, it was both by his might and
my might. No, to them that have no might, No might. He increaseth strength. Even the youth shall faint and
be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall. Those that appear
to be the strongest, they're going to fall. They're going
to become faint. But they that wait upon the Lord
shall renew strength. They'll mount up with wings as
eagles. They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and
not faint. You know what it is to wait on
the Lord? It doesn't mean to weary the Lord like Ahaz did
and say, well now, I'm not going to ask the Lord, I'm not going
to tempt God. It doesn't mean that at all. It doesn't mean
to use the sovereignty of God to excuse ourselves while at
all the while we're really looking to our might and our power and
our wisdom. It doesn't mean that. You know
what waiting on the Lord means? Waiting on the Lord means we
look not to ourselves. You look to yourself a grasshopper
of prevention. That's where we're going to.
The Lord Solomon said, we're coming to a point where old age,
you're going to rise up at the sound of a bird. A flesh, a grasshopper
would prevent this flesh from doing anything. I've said this
to you before, you've seen it, you've seen it so clearly. You
sit there, you think you've got some liberty, you've got some
power, you've got something that you're accomplishing when you're
preaching and everybody's, boy, they're just hanging on to every
word, paying attention, and all of a sudden you start seeing
everybody's eyes look up at the ceiling. And you look up there
and God shows you, you've got no might, no power, there's a
little old bitty wasp or a little moth or something bouncing around
on the ceiling and everybody's just staring at it showing us
showing me and you both we don't have any power and might us a
little bitty grasshopper can take that away from you little
moth But here's what it is to wait on the Lord. It's to believe
the Lord. It's to look only to the Lord.
That's what it is. Sometimes it involves standing
still. Sometimes it involves going forward. But it's waiting
on Him. The Lord said to His people in
Isaiah 43, verse 1, Now thus saith the Lord that created thee,
O Jacob, and he that formed thee, O Israel, fear not. He said,
I've redeemed you. I've called you by your name
and your mind. You see, Christ has borne the
wrath of judgment. He borne that away for his people. He bore that. He bore wrath. He bore the righteous indignation,
the righteous wrath of God that you and I deserve, that the believer
deserve. That's what he did. So this correction,
this is coming upon his people. He says, it's not wrath, it's
correction. It's correction. God took down
all the hedges. We've seen this over and over.
He took down all the hedges around the nation. He let Babylon come
in and take them, completely take them. And he said, but I'm
not doing this for wrath. You're going to pass through
fire and you're going to pass through flood. It's going to
look like, fire looks like fire, flood looks like flood. It looks
like what it looks like, don't it? But he's saying, but it's
not wrath towards his child. It's keeping grace. It's correcting
grace of a faithful father so that we don't perish in this
world with this world. That's what it is. That's what
he said to us. Because he said, you're my witnesses. And you remember this, brethren.
Listen to this. The biggest goal, the largest divide, the biggest
step for you and I was from total sin to being made completely
righteous. Who did that? God did. By Christ Jesus, by his grace. There's another huge divide.
From unbelief to faith. Who delivered us from that and
who keeps delivering us from that? God does. God does. He does it through
His Spirit. We don't do it. Why did the Lord keep bringing
one test after another into Jerusalem and into Judah? Why did He keep
on teaching them over and over? We've seen it all through it.
First it was Assyria. They failed miserably. Then it was... They came right
up to the walls, you remember, and they were all around the
walls, making all this noise and all this racket. The Lord
said they reinforced the walls, they reinforced the bulwarks
on the outside, they reinforced the towers, they used great ingenuity,
they drained all the water and filled up the outer wall between
the outer wall and the inner wall. Took down stones out of
houses and rebuilt walls with them. They did all these things
to fortify themselves in Jerusalem. Cities were surrounded. Cities
were like a castle. That's what Jerusalem was like.
It's like what you picture as a castle. They did all that to
fortify everything. But God said, you've done all
that, but you hadn't looked to me, the one who made all those
things. And then he took down his hedge and he brought Babylon
upon him. Why did he say out? Then he raised
up a man who wasn't even from their midst, who was an idolater
out in the east. And he said, I'm calling him,
I'm calling the ravenous one from the east. Remember how he
brought a crow and fed Ezekiel, I mean Elijah? He said, I'm bringing
one from the east. I'm not even going to use anybody
out of your midst to do this work. I'm bringing somebody from
completely out of your world in to do this. That's exactly
what God did in His Son, Christ Jesus. To stain our pride, to
make us evil. We ain't saving ourselves. But
why did he do all that? And he brought down all the Babylonians,
he brought down the whole city, he brought down everything, and
he kept doing this over and over and over and over, teaching his
children this same lesson over and over. Why? Why? Why? Why
did he keep doing that? Why does he keep teaching us?
What's he teaching us? Look at verse 13, Isaiah 43,
13. Yea, before the day was, I am
he. You get up worried about today, There was somebody before there
was a day. God our salvation. He said, before the day was,
I'm He. And there's none that can deliver out of my hand. I
will work, and who shall let it? Who's going to turn it back?
Who's going to turn it back? This is why He said He did it.
Thus saith the Lord, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel. For your
sake, I've done this. For your sake, what do we seek?
He did it to remind us who He is. Look, for your sake, I sent
the Babylon, I brought down all their nobles, the Chaldeans who's
crossing the ship. Why? To show us who He is. Remind
us of who He is. I'm the Lord, your Holy One,
the Creator of Israel, your King. That's who I am. He did it for
your sake to remind us that the victory was won by our Lord before
as yet the enemy came forth. It's a review, isn't it? It's
a review. Look at verse 17. Which bringeth
forth the chariot, the horse, the army, and the power. I brought
them all forth. They shall lie down together.
They shall not rise. They are extinct. They are quenched
as told. They are already conquered. Well,
they look alive and mighty and strong. The Lord said, but they
are already conquered. I brought them forth. I did it. He said, for your sake to remind
us that all grace is at His hand. Look at verse 20. Look at the
end there. I give waters in the wilderness,
rivers in the desert, to give drink to my people, my chosen.
This people have I fought for myself. They'll show forth my
praise. What do we see in Isaiah 44,
7? And who as I shall call and shall
declare it and set it in order for me, since I appointed the
ancient people? See these questions? We've got
to learn to answer these questions, don't we? Who did this? And the
things that are coming and shall come. Who did that? Who did that? Verse 8. He says,
Fear ye not, neither be afraid. Have I not I told thee from that
time, and have declared it? I've told you. You're my witnesses. Is there a God beside me? Yea,
there's no God. I know not any. Look down at
verse 10. Who has formed a God or most
in a gravid image as profitable for nothing. And you think about
this. I was thinking about this today. You think about this,
really, truly. Really and truly, if we're not
trusting God, what we're trusting money. But just always the case. Always
the case. You realize that our dollar starts
out with engraving. Have you thought about that? It starts out by being engraved,
an engraving. And everything that's used in
the process to make it is earth. Everything that, there's nothing
that's used to make it that wasn't, that God didn't make. He just gave me wisdom to put
it all together and make it. Nothing. Look down at verse 19. Look at that question at the
end. Shall I fall down to the stalk of a tree? Am I going to
fall down and worship that which is of the earth? When I got a
God like this, when I got the God, the true God, This is what he says, verse 21.
Remember these, O Jacob and Israel. Remember all these questions.
Remember the answer to these questions. Without my servant,
I formed you. You're my servant, O Israel.
You'll not be forgotten of me. I have blotted out as a thick
cloud thy transgressions, and as a cloud thy sins. Return unto
me, for I have redeemed thee. It's done. It's done! Sing! Shout! He said. Look down
at verse 24. Thus saith the Lord thy Redeemer,
and He that formed thee from the womb, I'm the Lord that maketh
all things. I'm the Lord that stretches forth
the heavens alone, that spreadeth abroad the earth by myself, that
frustrateth the tokens of the liars, makes diviners mad, that
turneth wise men backward and makes their knowledge foolish.
I'm the Lord that confirms the word of his servant and performs
the counsel of his messengers. It says to Jerusalem thou shalt
be inhabited and to the cities of Judah you shall be built.
I'll raise up the decayed places thereof. I'm the Lord that says
to the deep be dry and I'll dry up thy rivers. that saith of
Cyrus, he is my shepherd, and shall perform all my pleasure,
even saying to Jerusalem, thou shalt be built to the temple,
thy foundation shall be laid. This is 200 years. You imagine
this. There they sit in Jerusalem,
and they got everything. They got, really, at this time
that he's saying this, it looks like they've got everything.
They got everything people could ask for. And the Lord said, Isaiah
told them this 200 years before it came to pass. They don't even
think that all these things are going to be taken from them,
that the Lord's going to do this to teach His people, much less
that He's going to raise up a man from the east and bring him in
and deliver him out of Babylon. And the Lord said, I'm telling
you, before it ever comes to pass, I'm going to do it. I'm going
to do it. And all that is pointing to Christ. Did He come forth? Yes, it came
forth. Look, now let's, we start, I
want to end with this, Isaiah 66. This is the last question
that Isaiah asked, the Lord asked through Isaiah. The first question
was, why should I correct you? Here's the last question. Shall
I bring to the birth and not cause to bring forth? Saith the Lord, shall I cause
to bring forth and shut the womb, saith God. Am I gonna cause my
child to just get right to the point of being born and not go
on and bring forth life? And then when I bring forth life
in you that I've brought forth life in, am I just gonna shut
up the womb and not bring forth life anymore? No, I'm gonna bring
forth life through you, old mother, just like I did through your
mother. You understand that? God said, I'm going to do that.
And he says, verse 10, so rejoice ye with Jerusalem. Who is that?
She's in heaven. Jerusalem's our Lord. It's the
saints that came before us that the Lord used to teach this gospel
throughout the history of this world. Rejoice with her. Be glad with her, all you that
love her. Rejoice for joy with her, all you that mourn for her.
Why, that you may suck and be satisfied with the breasts of
her consolations, her comforts, that you may milk out and be
delighted with the abundance of her glory. What's all that
mean? I spent some time this week with a little baby. And he'd get all whiny and fussy
and fretting. How old is Christopher? Six months? Ten months. He'd get all whiny
and fussy and he's just big enough, you know, to crawl around a little
bit and pull himself up on things and to think he can stand. He's
like us. And he'd crawl around and he'd
get to looking and trying to do something and he couldn't
do it. And he'd just start fretting. He'd start whining. He'd start
complaining and fussing. And his mama would take and give
him milk. And you know what he did? He
just milked out. You ever seen a baby milk out?
He just passed out. Happy, content, satisfied. His eyes just fall asleep. Everything's happy. We pick him
up. Put him on our knees. Bounce
him around. He'd just laugh. Be so happy. There was a little bell hanging
from the ceiling. And he never got old to it. You pick him up,
take him over there. Reach up, touch that bell. Ding! He'd just
laugh. Just happy. Every time he'd turn
from that though back to himself, he'd start threatening him. This
is what the Lord said, verse 12. Thus saith the Lord, Behold,
I'll extend peace to Jerusalem like a river. in the glory of
the Gentiles like a flowing stream. I'm going to save my people whether
they're Jew or Gentile, in Jerusalem and amongst the Gentiles. It's
going to come like a flowing stream, like milk out of a mama's
breast. Then shall you suck. You shall
be born upon her sides and be dandled upon her knees. You see
the picture of that little baby? As one whom his mother comforteth. Look at this now. So will I. comfort you. So will I, the Lord
said, comfort you. And you shall be comforted in
Jerusalem. And when you see this, your heart
will rejoice. Your heart shall rejoice. And
your bones shall flourish like a herb. And the hand of the Lord
will be known toward his servants and his indignation toward his
enemies. You see, the Lord is going to take us and make us
babies. Milk out, drink from his grace, like a child from
the breast of a mother. Dandled upon his knees, comforted
by him, so that our bones flourish. That little baby, you couldn't
even see it, but you know what he was doing? He was just growing, growing. bones flourishing, growing. And
he says, and through this, through what I'm doing in my church,
you know what's going to happen? He said two things. I'm going
to make my hand known toward my servants, my children, and
I'm going to make my name known, my indignation known toward my
enemies. That's what I'm doing, he said. Did the Lord do it?
You read the last part of that chapter. I won't finish it, but
did the Lord do it? Yeah, He did it. He saved His
elect in the nation. He started with them. And they
went from there and they went into all the Gentile nations
preaching this gospel. And that's how it came to me
and you. That's how it came to me and you. So will He do it
in this place? Yeah, He'll do it. He'll do it.
You feel like you failed the last exam? Feel like you failed
the last test? I hope so. I hope you do. The
day we've regarded ourselves and think we've passed with flying
colors, we not only have failed the test, we've dropped out of
school entirely. That's right. We have to be continually
taught. We just don't know. We don't
have any wisdom. God's our wisdom. He's our wisdom. Now let's go back and let's review
what God's taught us And let's come back to the test and say
from the heart, Lord, forgive my unbelief. I trust you. I trust you. Let's stand together.