Now, I love to see that Isaiah just
keeps on preaching the same gospel over and over and over. It thrills me to see it. We've
been looking at these woes that he's been declaring since back
around Isaiah 12 or 13. But in every one of them, he
declares the same message, the same message. He declares that
God is absolutely sovereign, that He is ruling all things
according to His purpose to accomplish that which He determined before
to be done using whole nations, right down to individual sinners.
Kings sitting on thrones and paupers that don't even have
a voice. He's using everything, droughts, He's using the heavens
and He's using the earth, natural things to bring about His purpose
completely. He softens. It speaks of His
wrath against sinners, against the depravity of men, men who
try to accomplish their way and their will in this world by their
own hand, by the strength and power of their own hand, who
really and truly are trying their dead level best to crawl up to
God and take Him off His throne and be God themselves. He shows
His utter contempt for such folly and how foolish it really is
for a sinner to think he can do something of that nature.
He declares in each one of these that he has sovereignly elected
a people unto salvation in Christ Jesus and that this people is
a people scattered throughout the nations. out of Israel, and
Ethiopia, and Egypt, and Assyria, and Babylon, and all these various
nations that he's been discussing, that he has a remnant in each
one. For every woe he pronounces to every nation, he pronounces
well to those who are righteous in his Son, whom he put in his
Son before the world began. He declares the absolute necessity
that He teach His people in the heart, through His Gospel, using
Isaiah to do it in this case. Because without Him declaring
this, none would know it. Without the Spirit quickening
and making it alive, none would understand. And this is a message
that has to be repeated over and over and over and over. I think it was Martin Luther
who said we have to be taught the gospel every day because
we forget it every day. I'm paraphrasing, but something
like that. We have to be taught it. Brother
Scott Richardson used to say the gospel is repetition. You
got to preach the same message over and over and over and over. And one day, I've seen it happen.
I've seen men sit and hear the same message preached over and
over and over. And somebody jump up after that
message and run up and say, you know, you said such and such,
and I have never heard that before. And the other person sitting
there saying, I've heard that every time we've been sitting
here. But that's how we are. We've
got to be taught it. Taught it. And one day the Lord
makes it known in our hearts and we jump up rejoicing. Never
saw that before. It's like a diamond. It's just
got facets. It's got little faces all over
it. And every way you turn it, there's
a new glimmering, just something shining. And any way you turn
it, you see something new in it. That's this gospel. And it
comes through the simple declaration of the sovereign grace of God
in Christ Jesus, given freely to sinners who lay hold of Him
by faith, saved by believing, by trusting Him. Well, that's
the Gospel message that he declares today. It's the same message
that the Lord taught Zerubbabel. He said, God's salvation is not
by might, it's not by power. Not by the might of men, not
by the power of men, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord. That's
how men are saved. Well, and that's the message
Isaiah sets forth here. Let's look now at Isaiah 17,
verse 12. Woe to the multitude of many
people, which make a noise like the noise of the seas, and to
the rushing of nations, that make a rushing like the rushing
of mighty waters." Now, something interesting about our text this
morning is that Isaiah doesn't ever particularly mention what
nation he's talking about. And if you read the commentaries,
about every commentary you read will give you a different idea
of what nation he's talking about. But I think the message is clear.
The message is this. This is the nation of the ungodly. This is the nation of the unregenerate. This is the nation of people
who think they can come to God by the work of their own hand.
That's who this nation is. And he says, They conquer, they
enlist men to fight for them as they conquer. And that's what
the Assyrian army did, and that's probably who he's speaking about
here, but as they would conquer a nation, they would make men,
not voluntarily, they would draft men involuntarily and force them
to fight for their nation. That's religion. That's exactly
what religion does. Draft men, and don't give you
a choice. You've got to fight for us. God's people do it voluntarily,
but they would do this, and they spoke loudly, and they carried
a big stick. He compares their boasting to
the noise of the ocean, to the noise of the seas. And He compares
their swiftness to the rushing of mighty rivers. The king of
Assyria sent his messengers to Judah, and this is what he said
to them. Thus saith the great king, the king of Assyria, what
confidence is this wherein thou trustest? Thou sayest, but they
are vain words, he said. Thou sayest, I have counsel and
strength for the war. Now on whom dost thou trust that
thou rebellest against me? He is boasting, proud, mighty,
boasting like the ocean and running like the rivers. Verse 13 says,
The nations shall rush like the rushing of many waters, but God
shall rebuke them. And they shall flee far off and
shall be chased as the chaff of the mountains before the wind.
That's a threshing floor he's describing there. The threshing
floor where they beat the dried wheat and the chaff is light
so it comes up and the winds come through the threshing floor
and the threshing fans thresh it so where the chaff blows away
with the wind. So all that's left is the fruit. He says that's what it's going
to be like. It's the chaff of the mountains before the wind.
Like a rolling thing before the whirlwind. You picture a tumbleweed
rolling across a desert. He said, that's what they're
going to be like. Dry, light chaff just driven away. And behold,
at evening time trouble, and before the morning he is not.
Now Assyria might be the nation whose destruction Isaiah is declaring
here, but look at the end of verse 14, and it tells us that
this word speaks of far more than just one nation. This is
the portion of them that spoil us. This is the lot of them that
rob us. Who's Isaiah speaking for? He's
speaking for God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy
Spirit. He's speaking for those God has called out in Judah,
who are the children of God, the remnant, the heritage, His
inheritance, whom He's put in Christ and whom Christ would
buy with the purchase of His own blood. And he says, this
is the portion of them that spoil us. and the lot of them that
rob us. Now here's what I want you to
see today. The Lord of heaven and earth overrules all the schemes
and plans of men to bring his elect remnant to behold that
we are nothing and we can do nothing to save ourselves. And
thus he brings each one each one of His elect to bow to Him,
to sanctify Him in our hearts, to see Him high and lifted up,
to see that He is indeed God, and we're helpless, needy, undeserving
sinners. And He brings us to worship Him
alone, who is the salvation of His people. Does that sound like
the last message we looked at in Isaiah? It was. It was the
message before. It was the message before that.
It's the message Isaiah's been declaring since chapter 1. It's
not because I'm just preaching the same message to you. This
is all Isaiah preached. And it's all he'll keep preaching
as we go through. All right, let's start here.
Isaiah 18.1. Woe to the land, shadowing with wings. which is
beyond the rivers of Ethiopia. See, he doesn't say who this
land is. He gives the name Ethiopia, so
we think it might be Ethiopia, but he just says the land shadowing
with wings. This is to his elect remnant
is who this is to. Listen. that sendeth ambassadors
by the sea, even in vessels of bulrushes upon the waters, saying,
Go, ye swift messengers, to a nation scattered and peeled, to a people
terrible from their beginning hitherto, a nation meted out
and trodden down, whose land the rivers have spoiled." Now
this is what the nations would say to their ambassadors as they
sent them into Judah. They called them a nation scattered
and peeled, a people who were mighty from the beginning hitherto,
but they've been meted out and trodden down, whose land the
rivers have spoiled. But there's another meaning to
this whole thing, too. Another meaning to these words.
Now, we don't know exactly who it refers to. Some say it's Ethiopia. Some say it's Egypt. It seems
to be Ethiopia because at the end of this chapter, or in the
next chapter, it deals with Egypt. Some even say this is Assyria
and what they're going to do. But here's the thing, at the
end of the next chapter, Egypt and Ethiopia and Assyria, among
those nations, God's elect remnant are brought to call upon Him
and to trust Him and bow to Him. That's who this is to. It's to
His chosen people whom He'll redeem. Now, as far as Ethiopia
goes, The description of the people is scattered. It means
they're tall, they're strong, they're drawn out. And this word
peeled means polished and smooth. And it fits the Ethiopian who
was tall, whose skin was black so that it appeared polished
and smooth. And this word peeled means obstinate. It means independent. And it's so because it was a
confident nation. It was a nation who was meting
out and trotting down people at this time. And they're sending
their ambassadors to Judah who at this time appear to be meted
out and trotting down themselves. And they're sending this message
to them. They're sending their ambassadors
to say, trust us, we'll save you. Now, if we're going to understand
the meaning here, I think we can understand the gospel in
this passage if we look at this phrase, the land shadowing with
wings. Right there in verse 1. Woe to
the land shadowing with wings. Now, Ethiopia had come to the
defense of Judah during this time when Assyria was coming
up against them. And in Isaiah 37, 9, we find
that the king of Assyria was told that Terhaka, king of Ethiopia,
is come forth to make war with thee. So he was going forth to
make war. And in the context of this phrase,
the phrase seems to have more to do with their imagining that
they would be the salvation of Judah by the strength of their
own hand. How does the land shadowing with
wings? Some say, well, it was that flooded
Delta land where there's so many locusts and mosquitoes and it
was all these wings and everything. True enough, true enough. But
they were fighting as if they could save Judah, as if they
could come forth and they could save Judah from the Assyrian
enemy. But the Lord describes the safety
that the believer has in scripture as being under the shadow of
his wings. Psalm 17, 18, keep me as the
apple of the eye. Hide me under the shadow of thy
wings from the wicked that oppress me, from my deadly enemies who
compass me about. Where? Under the shadow of thy
wings. Psalm 36, 7 says, how excellent
is thy loving kindness, O God, therefore the children of men
put their trust under the shadow of thy wings. David said, be
merciful unto me, O God, be merciful unto me, for my soul trusteth
in thee. Yea, in the shadow of thy wings
I will make my refuge until these calamities be overpassed. Keep me as the apple of the eye,
hide me under the shadow of thy wings. How many do you think,
maybe the eyelashes are like the shadow of a wing that protects
the apple of the eye? And that's what the analogy is,
is the shadow of the wings protecting the apple of the eye. This is
the apple of the eye, isn't it, the pupil? The Lord protects
His people just like this part of our eyes protect, that delicate
little thing. That's what we are and that's
how He protects us. But He does it under the shadow
of His wing. And so this gospel which Isaiah declares is not
a woe here in this case. The wording is hope. It's take
heed. You who imagine that salvation
is under your wings, take heed. Now, listen to this again. Go
ye swift messengers to a nation scattered and peeled, to a people
terrible from their beginning, hitherto a nation meted out and
trodden down, whose land the rivers have spoiled. They sent
ambassadors to Judah. They sent ambassadors to the
Lord's people in Judah. saying to them, trust us and
under the shadow of our wings and we'll protect you. And Isaiah
says, now you turn around and you swift messengers and you
go back and you send word back to Ethiopia to the nations from
which you came. For those that are strict historians
that might hear this, that might disagree with me that this is
Ethiopia. God's saying to his ambassadors, you go into the
nations and you declare to them My people aren't going to be
saved under the shadow of your wings. You are the people trodden
down. You are the people meted out,
and you're going to be saved under the shadow of my wings.
That's the message. And Isaiah, here being an ambassador
for Christ, tells them, you go back and tell the folks that. You go back as an ambassador
for Christ and tell them what the Lord's going to do. Listen to the Lord Jesus Christ
in Isaiah 49, chapter 1. Listen to what the Lord Jesus
Christ says to the Owls, that is, the Gentiles. Listen. Listen, O Owls, unto me, and
hearken, ye people from far. The Lord hath called me from
the womb. From the bowels of my mother
hath he made mention of my name, and he hath made my mouth like
a sharp sword in the shadow of his hand, hath he hid me, and
made me a polished shaft. In his quiver hath he hid me,
and he said unto me, Thou art my servant, O Israel, in whom
I will be glorified." This is the Lord Jesus Christ speaking.
Look down at verse 6. And he said, it is a light thing
that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob
and to restore the preserved of Israel. I will also give thee
for a light to the Gentiles that thou mayest be my salvation until
the end of the earth. Thus saith the Lord, the Redeemer
of Israel, and His Holy One, to Him whom man despiseth, to
Him whom the nation abhorreth, to a servant of rulers, kings
shall see and arise. Princes also shall worship because
of the Lord that is faithful, and the Holy One of Israel, and
He shall choose thee." Do you see that? This is the Lord saying
exactly what Isaiah was saying to thee. Go back and tell them.
The Lord's people are going to be saved under the shadow of
His wings. Alright, let's look here now at verse 3. It's as
if Isaiah is declaring what Paul was declaring in Ephesians chapter
2 and 3 that I read to you earlier. All ye inhabitants of the world,
Jew and Gentile, bond and free, all ye inhabitants of the world
and dwellers on the earth, see ye, the word is you shall see,
when he lifteth up an ensign, an ensign on the mountains, when
he bloweth a trumpet, ye shall hear." Now, we've seen time and
again through Isaiah that the Lord used whole nations to declare
what He would accomplish in the person of His Son. We've seen
this over and over. He would gather the Assyrian
army on the mountains surrounding Judah like the enemies of our
Lord surrounded Him on the cross. So all the nations could see
and know this was going on. And in both cases, it was the
Lord who lifted up the ensign. It was the Lord who did this.
Look there. when He lifteth up an ensign
on the mountains. Now concerning the enemies who
came upon Judah, what do we see back in Isaiah 5? Let me read
this to you. Isaiah 5, 26. He will lift up
an ensign to the nations from far and will hiss unto them from
the end of the earth and behold they shall come with speed swiftly. The Assyrians were doing God's
bidding. They came because God said, this is where you want
to rally to, right here, to this mountain. Come to this mountain
and surround this mountain in Jerusalem, right here. This is
where my people are. Come here if you want to win
the victory. Come right here. And they all came, the enemies
of God, the enemies of righteousness, the enemies of our Lord, the
enemies of His people. They all came to the neck of
Jerusalem. And concerning our Lord Jesus,
we read that the rulers were gathered together. who gathered
them. He gathered them. They were gathered
together. They didn't come there by accident.
They came there according to purpose. They were gathered together
against the Lord and against His Christ for of a truth against
thy holy child Jesus whom thou hast anointed both Herod and
Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and the people of Israel were
gathered together for to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined
before to be done." Oh, the heathen raged. They came willfully of
their own rebellious heart, of their own will and desire to
destroy God and to destroy His people. They raged. They came
because they wanted to come. All he had to do was take the
restraint off of them. And they imagined a vain thing.
They imagined, Assyria imagined they could take Jerusalem. They
imagined they could take Judah. Just as Satan and the army imagined
they could take God. They could take Him by taking
His Son. They could take Him when they
took Him at the cross. A vain thing to imagine. But
this they imagined nonetheless. And it says, they set themselves and they
took counsel together. All the meeting of the minds
of the world's most wise rulers and leaders came up with this
plan. Fellas, we can take Judah. We
can take Jerusalem. Fellas, we can kill this Jesus
of Nazareth. We can take Him. We can cast
Him off and do away with Him. And they were saying, let us
break their bands asunder and cast away their cords from us.
That's exactly what they were saying. He said, when I lift
up this engine, this flag, you're going to see it. And when I blow
the trumpet, you're going to hear it. And they all came. All the enemies saw and heard
and they came. And they all gathered around
for the host. But look what he says in Isaiah
14, verse 4, For so the Lord said unto me, Now here's what
the Lord said. This is what Isaiah is speaking.
The Lord said, I will take my rest. I will consider in my dwelling
place like a clear heat upon herbs, like a cloud of dew in
the heat of harvest. The Lord says, I'll calmly look
on and I won't interpose. I won't stop this thing. It's
going to all seem like a promise of success to the enemy. And
I'm going to let it go on. I'm going to let them come. Let
the whole host gather together." And those Assyrians came upon
Judah and the Lord rested because they were doing exactly what
the Lord's hand and His counsel determined before to be done
when they came upon Judah. You know what it was? You know
what His counsel had determined before to be done? The whole
matter between Assyria and Judah was to set forth the glory of
His Son. There's but one reason that the
Assyrian army could not destroy the children of Judah. Why none
of the enemies could destroy the children of Judah. Syria
couldn't do it. Rimeliah's son, Ephraim, they
couldn't do it. The Assyrians conquered them
and then they tried to come and take Jerusalem and they can't
do it. And you remember why? You remember what Isaiah told
Ahaz way back there? The Lord himself shall give you
a sign. Behold, a virgin shall conceive
and bear a son and shall call his name Immanuel. He's coming
through Judah. Now let me ask you something.
How foolish does a people have to be if the Lord God of heaven
and earth says that His Son, His Savior, His Christ, His Messiah
is coming through this nation Judah It don't take a rocket
scientist to figure out that you're not going to take that
nation. You're not going to destroy that nation until the Messiah's
come. Now after he's come, he may turn
them over, but you're not going to take that nation as long as
until his Messiah comes, until his Christ comes. And so it was
at Calvary As the Lord gathered that whole enemy round about
to do whatsoever His hand and counsel determined to be done,
all seemed like a promise of success to the enemies of God.
The serpent was coming there and he was bruising the heel
of the woman's sea. But the Lord Jehovah says in
all this, I'll take my rest, my peace, my quietness, my satisfaction. And I'll consider, I'll behold,
I'll look, and I'll show regard to my set dwelling place, my
fixed established place, my foundation. I'll make him, that one, my consideration. Like a clear heat upon herbs. You know what that word clear
means? It means a glowing heat, a dazzling heat, a shining heat. like a cloud of dew, a thick
covering in the heat of harvest. Christ Jesus, the Son of God,
is the one in whom the Lord Jehovah rested all His purpose from the
foundation of the world. Ephesians 1 says, in whom He
trusted, who first trusted Christ. That's God who first trusted
Christ. The God the Father first trusted His Son. You and I aren't
going to receive the glory. No man's going to receive the
glory of being the first one to trust Christ. You think that?
God's going to. He's preeminent in all things.
He's going to receive the preeminence in first trusting His Son. He
trusted His Son. That's his set dwelling place.
He's the one in whom all his purpose rested, is fixed, established,
founded. He said, I'll take my ease, my
satisfaction, considering my set dwelling place, my fixed,
established foundation, and I'll be like a clear heat, like a
shining, shimmering heat upon the herbs in his wrath being poured out
on his son. in that heat covering His Son,
enveloping His Son in the wrath of God. You know what was taking
place? The glory of God was shining. The glory of God was shining
forth when that took place. That the thick cloud of His righteousness
might be imputed to His people. That we might be made the righteousness
of God in Him. And He said, therefore, let them
come. Let them come and let them think they're doing exactly what
their heart and intent is and their purpose is. Let them come.
But he says, they might rage, they might imagine a vain thing,
they may say, let us break their bands asunder, but he that sitteth
in the heavens shall laugh. He shall have them in derision. Then, after they've done this
thing, he shall speak unto them in his wrath and vex them in
his sore displeasure. Look at verse 5. before the harvest, before the
harvest, when the bud is perfect and the sour grape is ripening
in the flower, it looks like it's just about to be ripe, they
look like they're just about to achieve the victory. He said,
just like you go out there and take your tomato plant. And those
little suckers that come out of that plant that aren't doing
anything but sapping the life out of the vine. They're just
there. They're not producing any fruit.
Not going to produce any fruit. They just exist as a sucker. They exist as a parasite. He said, I'm going to go to these
nations, to these people, just like you go out there with a
little pruning knife, and I'm just going to clip it off. Clip
it off. Clip it off. That's judgment. That's God's judgment. You know
where judgment took place? Judgment took place at the cross.
The judgment of God's people and the judgment of those who
hate God took place at the cross. The judgment in the last days
is just going to be a declaration of the judgment that took place
in Christ for his people. He said, at that time, I'm going
to cut off the sprigs with pruning hooks and take away and cut down
the branches. And they shall be left together
into the fowls of the mountains, into the beasts of the earth.
And the fowls shall summer upon them, and all the beasts of the
earth shall winter upon them. And in that hour in which the
enemy thought they had gained the victory, that's what our
Lord did. He said, they're going to come
like rushing waters. They're going to come, they're going
to be making a loud noise, and they're going to be boasting
of what they're going to accomplish. And He said, and I'm going to
rebuke them. And when I do, they're going to be like chaff on the
threshing floor. They're going to be blown away.
They're going to be like a tumbleweed, just tumbling, tumbling, tumbling
away. Do you recall how the Assyrian
army was defeated? It came to pass that night that
the angel of the Lord went out and smoked in the camp of the
Assyrians 104 score and 5,000. And when they arose early in
the morning, behold, they were all dead corpses. He said, in
the evening, trouble is going to come. I picture our Lord,
when they came to Him in the evening to break His legs, and
He had already given up the ghost, and He lay in the ground, He
lay in the tomb the whole Sabbath, Saturday, and then in the morning,
towards the first of the week, He arose. He says to them, in
the evening, tide, trouble, but in the morning, He is not. They
came to that tomb and they rolled back the stone. And the angel
of the Lord said, go in and look. He's not there. He's not there. He's gone. Just like that angel
of the Lord came through in the night and smoked the Assyrian
army and left four score and all those thousands, five thousand
dead. And when they arose early in
the morning, there was nothing but dead corpses there. So it was with those who were
left in Jerusalem after our Lord was crucified, after He rose.
Those that were left who continued in that religion, when that veil
was split from top to bottom, were going through a dead religion,
a corpse, a dead thing, dead folks, dead men walking about
doing dead religion. That's all it was. But notice
this. Ethiopia didn't do it. Egypt
didn't do it. The angel of the Lord did it.
That's who smoked the Assyrian army. The angel of the Lord.
And so it is with the victory, the angel of the Lord, the Son
of God, the Lord Jesus Christ is the one who won the victory.
Let me read the rest of Psalm 2. That's what I've been quoting
from about the heathen raging. Let me read the rest of it to
you. Psalm 2, or a few verses. Psalm 2, 6. Yet have I set my
king upon my holy hill of Zion. And I will declare the decree.
The Lord hath said unto me, Thou art my son, this day have I begotten
thee. Ask of me, and I shall give thee
the heathen for thy inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the
earth for thy possession. Back in our text, the Lord says,
all shall see when I lift up this engine, and all shall hear
when I blow this trumpet. The Lord, when He arose, God
the Father said, I'm pleased with you, my son. He said, what
do you want? He said, I want my people scattered
throughout the nations. The heathen remnant that's scattered
throughout that I've purchased with my blood, that's what I
want. They're my inheritance. They were promised to me by my
father from before the world began. That's my inheritance.
That's my due. That's what's coming to me. My
God, my father said that's what he would give to me. The Lord
Jesus said, that's what I want. I want my inheritance. You remember Philip was sent
out after the Lord rose and he was preaching, dispersed out. He was gone out from Jerusalem.
He goes out there on the old Gaza road, not the new Gaza road,
not the new road that went to Gaza. They had a brand new, nice,
eight-lane highway that went to Gaza. nice shoulders on it,
and places where you could stop, use the telephone if you got
in trouble. I mean, no toll booths or anything, just a straight
shot to Gaza. He didn't go on that road. He went on the old
Gaza road that that new Gaza road bypassed. He went out there
on that old Gaza road in the high noon, the middle of the
daytime, in the middle of the desert. The least likely place
in the least likely time, and there he found the least likely
character, an Ethiopian. An Ethiopian. And he preached
Jesus Christ to that Ethiopian. And that Ethiopian said, I believe
that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. And Philip said, if you
believe with all your heart, you can be baptized. He said,
I believe. And he was baptized. And the
Scripture says, and he went on his way rejoicing. Rejoicing
in who? Look with me here in our text,
verse 7. In that time shall the present, the gift, be brought
unto the Lord of hosts of a people scattered and peeled. From a
people terrible from their beginning hitherto. A nation meted out
and trodden underfoot whose land the rivers have spoiled. They
are going to bring a gift to the Lord, to the place of the
name of the Lord of hosts, Mount Zion. That's sovereign electing
grace, is what that is. That's God's grace bringing His
redeemed that are scattered in all the nations. That's Him going
out to this Ethiopian eunuch and preaching the gospel of Christ
to him. And Him giving him a heart to believe in that Ethiopian
eunuch, confessing him in believer's baptism, and going on his way
rejoicing in Christ Jesus the Lord. He said, I'll turn to the
people. I'll turn to the people of pure
language. that they may call upon the name
of the Lord to serve Him with one consent from beyond the rivers
of Ethiopia. My suppliants, even the daughter
of my dispersed, shall bring mine offering." They're going
to bring mine offering. What's this offering? What are
they going to bring? What's the offering the Ethiopian
eunuch brought? Look with me, Isaiah 66. Verse 20. And they shall bring all your
brethren an offering unto the Lord out of all nations. They
brought the people. What did the Lord say He wanted?
I want my people. And the Lord said they are going
to bring a gift. You know what the gift the Lord desired? His
people. And he says, through this gospel,
they're going to bring the brethren. And look where it says, they're
going to bring them to my holy mountain, Jerusalem, saith the Lord, as
the children of Israel bring an offering and a clean vessel
unto the house of the Lord. And I'll take of them for priests
and for Levites. I'm going to make priests out
of these people. I'm going to make kings and priests out of
these people who didn't even know my name, who were Gentiles. Because I'm going to make them
like an offering in a clean vessel. You know what your body is? It's
a clean vessel. It's been washed in the blood
of Christ. It's been sanctified, justified in the name of the
Lord Jesus Christ and by the Holy Spirit. It's a clean vessel.
And he says, and they're going to bring, through the Gospel,
they're going to bring my brethren an offering. In Romans 10. Romans 12, Paul said, I beseech
you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you
present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto
God, which is your reasonable service. I watched this documentary
the other day that I thought was interesting. It was about
these POWs. I never heard about this mission
before, but it was in the Philippines. It was a camp there that was
sort of just off the beaten path on an island. Nobody had really
paid any attention that this was a POW camp, that there was
a bunch of American civilians captured there. Various groups of the Marines
went in, some from the air, some from the ground, and they released
these people. And when they released them,
Some of the people were so badly starved and they were so badly
affected in their thinking because they had been without food and
they had been in this place and they had some possessions that
they owned when they were taken. Some had just possessions that
they had acquired while they were there. Like the cot that
they slept on was the only thing that some of them had, but that
was like a worldly possession to them because that's all they
had. And whenever the troops came
to get them, they had only a short time to get them out of this
camp. to get them into these tank-like boats that would take
them across the water and get them out of there. And they had
something they never expected to happen was a bunch of these
people took these cots and these mattresses and some had like
a little desk or something. They tried to take those desks
and tried to take those things and bring them with them. And
so it was just slow. I mean, they weren't going anywhere
because they couldn't carry all that stuff with them. And there
was others there who had been there just as long, but they
were thinking clearly. They were in their right mind.
And those people were screaming at the top of their lungs to
the other people and they were saying, drop that stuff. Leave
that stuff and run. We're free. We've been set free. Leave all that stuff behind you
and come and go. We're free. Whenever the Lord saves a person,
when He frees someone, He said, if I set you free, you shall
be free indeed. And when He frees someone, He
makes that person realize that they've been starving. He makes
that person realize that what they considered valuable possessions
are no possessions at all. He makes them behold that what
they thought was life was nothing but being a prisoner, a captive,
held captive by the enemy. And when he sets them free, When
he reveals Christ to that person, he reveals Christ in the freedom
that's in Christ and the liberty that's in Christ and the light
and easy yoke of Christ our Redeemer so much so that they don't have
a problem letting go of those worthless self-righteousnesses
and rags. They let them go and they flee
after the one who has released them and redeemed them. And they
cry out to everyone along the way, let that other stuff go! We're free! Let it go! Follow
the one that's redeemed us. Follow the captain of our salvation
that's taken us away. Follow him! And the fact of the
matter is, brethren, those that haven't been freed indeed and
still want to hold on and just cling to that stuff and hang
on to it, they're not in their right mind. They don't understand
they've been freed. They don't behold Christ who
frees His people because when He frees us, brethren, when He
frees us, These people, he said, they'll come to me from Ethiopia,
and from Assyria, and from Egypt, and from Babylon, and from all
the nations where my elect remnant are scattered, and they'll leave
all that other stuff behind them, and they'll come because they've
been set free, and they will come to my place, the place where
I've put my name. Now, where's that place? Where's
the place they'll come to? Princes shall come out of Egypt,
Ethiopia shall soon stretch out her hands unto God. That's who. When Isaiah speaks
here and they talk about coming to Jerusalem and they talk about
coming to the Mount, they were talking to people who only knew
The temple at Jerusalem. Who only knew Mount Zion in Israel. Who only knew those things. And
they used those things to describe heavenly things. That's what
Isaiah was doing. He was using those things to
describe Christ Jesus in glory. To the church of God. To heavenly
Jerusalem. That's where His name is. That's
where His set dwelling is. And His dwelling place is with
His people. And that's where they're coming to. They're coming
to Christ the Lord. uniting with his brethren and
following him because they've been free. And he said that's
where they're coming. I want to end with this. I was
thinking the other night, we were sitting out on the deck
at the house, some of us were, and we were talking about politics
and talking about how that things are right now in Afghanistan
and Iraq and Iran and all the different countries and how that
we're trying to make allegiances with different ones and fighting
against other ones and all these things, you know. Of course,
like always, we had it all figured out and had all the solutions
of what needs to be done to take care of the whole situation,
you know. And I thought about it as we sat there, and I thought,
you know, I could see the children of Judah sitting around in Isaiah's
day after they ate, sitting there thinking, you know, we need Ahaz
to be gone. Then when Hezekiah came, they
said, oh, we got a good king now. He's going to lead us out
of this mess. And they talked about the different confederacies.
You know, Ethiopia, if we made that alliance with Ethiopia and
with Egypt, those are some strong nations. They could come to our
defense and Assyria wouldn't have anything to do with us.
Just like we sat around talking. And Isaiah said, fellas, all
this is pointing us to Christ to come. He's the one that's
coming. These ambassadors need to go
back and be ambassadors for Christ and say, we're not going to be
saved under the shadow of your wing, we're going to be saved
under the shadow of God's wing. He's going to call out his people
and his purpose is going to be fulfilled and accomplished just
as he's determined before for it to be done. That's been the
case in every generation. I heard a woman one time, I was
talking to this lady, We were at a restaurant and I said, how
are you doing? And man, she just unloaded on how terrible the
world was and how bad everything was going. Just gloom, gloom,
gloom, gloom, gloom. And she said, this is the worst
time it's ever been in the history of the world. And I was only
about 14 at this time and I didn't know the gospel. But I had sense
enough to know this, and I shouldn't have probably been saying this,
I shouldn't have said this to an adult, but I said, I bet you the worst
time in the history of the world was when we nailed Christ to
the cross. Can you imagine? He said, I'm going to lift up
the engine, and you're going to see it, and you're going to
hear it. Can you imagine being in around Jerusalem in those
days, and Galilee, and hearing about this Jesus of Nazareth,
and hearing far and wide that this One is saying He's the Christ,
that He's the Son of God, and thinking, I wonder if He is.
And then the next thing you hear is, the rulers and the princes
and the Gentiles and the Israelites together nailed Him to a cross. But that accomplished the purpose
of God. And it bruised Satan's head and
destroyed all our enemies and brought in an everlasting righteousness
for us. And he said, after this, I'm
sending my gospel into all the nations and I'm going to bring
them out. And that's what he's doing. So
don't fear. Don't trouble. Don't be troubled.
Sit around and surmise and solve all the world's problems all
you want to. But know this. What He's doing, He's doing to
glorify His Son. And in the end, we're going to
be gathered at His throne glorifying Him. That's how it's going to
be.