Let's begin our second service
by standing and singing Rock of Ages 126, Rock of Ages. It's been a while since we sang
that. Rock of Ages, clap for me. Let me hide myself in thee. Let the water and the blood from
thy wounded side which flowed be of sin the double cure. Save from wrath and make me pure. Could my tears forever flow? Could my zeal no longer know? These for sin could not atone,
Thou must save and Thou alone. In my hand no price I bring,
Simply to Thy cross I cling. While I draw this fleeting breath,
When my eyes shall close in death, When I rise to worlds unknown,
And behold thee on thy throne, Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let
me hide myself in thee. Morning. To spare you this voice, I'm
going to read a short psalm this morning. Psalm 16. Psalm chapter
16. Preserve me, O God, for in thee
do I put my trust. O my soul, thou hast said unto
the Lord, Thou art my Lord. My goodness extendeth not to
thee, but to the saints that are in the earth, and to the
excellent, in whom is all my delight. Their sorrows shall
be multiplied. that hasten after another God.
Their drink offerings of blood will I not offer, nor take up
their names into my lips. The Lord is the portion of mine
inheritance and of my cup. Thou maintainest my lot. The
lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places. Yea, I have a goodly
heritage. I will bless the Lord who hath
given me counsel. Our rains also instruct me in
the night seasons. I have set the Lord always before
me, because he is at my right hand. I shall not be moved. Therefore my heart is glad, and
my glory rejoiceth. My flesh also rests in hope,
for thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer
thine holy one to see corruption. Thou wilt show me the path of
life, and thy presence is fullness of joy. At thy right hand there
are pleasures forevermore. Let's pray. Father, we come to you thankful
this morning for this passage of scripture. Lord, we. We ask
that you always allow us to put our trust in you, and give us
a God-given faith to be able to do so. And Father, we're thankful,
as always, for a place to come to hear the gospel. There are
few and far between, and Father, you've chosen to raise one up
right here, Southwest Missouri, and Father, we're thankful for
it. We ask that it grow at your discretion. And Father, we're thankful for
the pastor that you've sent to us. And we ask that you watch
over him, Lord, and let him have his time and study and watch
over him as he studies. And Father, we ask that you watch
over this world and the things that are going on in it right
now. And Father, let us remember that The only thing we have to
worry about is this area right here, this room right here. Nothing
else is important. Anything that goes on around
us, Father, all that's important is what's preached here and the
one that's with us as we hear the gospel. Father, we ask that
you just watch over and care for us in Christ's name. Our second hymn will be 258,
He Hideth My Soul, 258. A wonderful Savior is Jesus my
Lord, a wonderful Savior to me. He hideth my soul in the cleft
of the rock where rivers of pleasure I see. He hideth my soul in the
cleft of the rock that shadows a dry, thirsty land. He hideth my life in the depths
of his love, and covers me there with his hand, and covers me
there with his hand. A wonderful Savior is Jesus my
Lord, He taketh my burden away. He holdeth me up and I shall
not be moved, He giveth me strength as my day. He hideth my soul
in the cleft of the rock that shadows a dry, thirsty land. He hideth my life in the depths
of his love and covers me there with his hand, and covers me
there with his hand. With numberless blessings each
moment He crowns, And filled with His fullness divine. I sing in my rapture, O glory
to God, For such a Redeemer as mine. He hideth my soul in the
cleft of the rock that shadows a dry, thirsty land. He hideth my life in the depths
of his love, and covers me there with his hand, and covers me
there with his hand. When clothed in his brightness
transported I rise To meet him in clouds of the sky His perfect
salvation, his wonderful love I'll shout with the millions
on high He hideth my soul in the cleft of the rock that shadows
a dry, thirsty land. He hideth my life in the depths
of his love and covers me there with his hand, and covers me
there with his hand. Good morning. All right, let's turn to Isaiah,
Isaiah 58. This morning I'm gonna look at
verses five through seven with you. Now, Paul, describes the
motivation of the believer. He describes the motivation of
the servant of God. And he says, I'm taking this
from 2 Corinthians 5 verse 14, he said, the love of Christ constraineth
us. We're moved and motivated by
Christ's love for us and Christ's love in us. So that this is a
motivation which is wrought in the new man, the creation of
our Lord and Savior. We're born of Christ and we're
brought into his kingdom and given life in his kingdom and
used in service in our Lord's kingdom as he sees fit. So that
taking another verse from 2 Corinthians 5 verse 17, Paul says, Therefore, if any man be in Christ,
he's a new creature. Old things have passed away.
Behold, all things are become new. Now the last time that we were
in Isaiah, we saw people who were yet laboring in dead, lifeless
works of religion. They were laboring in man's dead
nature. And so the Lord sent his prophet,
to declare the sin and the iniquity of the people. He said, show
my people their transgression in verse one. And the house of
Jacob, their sins. Tell it to them. And God did
this because they were motivated by the applause of men and they
were trying to gain the favor of God by the things that they
were doing. They wanted God to take notice
of what they did and then to reward them for their labors.
And so it says in verse 3, They asked the God, they were saying
this in their hearts or out loud. Wherefore, or why have we fasted,
say they, and thou seest not? Wherefore have we afflicted our
soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Before the new birth, before
our Lord reveals Christ in us. and our hope in Christ, we're
upset because we're laboring for our acceptance with God. We're trying to get God's attention
and him to take notice of us and bless us by giving us ease
and relieve our mind of our fears. by the things that we're doing.
But if we're the Lord's, he won't let us find comfort by the works
of our hands. And so our Savior delivers us
from dead religion. He delivers us from those things
which we're walking in and doing and trusting him. He makes us
to see, you're not trusting in me, you're trusting in dead works.
You're looking over here when Here I am the servant of the
Lord who was who has come who was sent of God to save my people
from their sins and so he teaches us when we go astray and he shows
us that our labors are for for want of reward or for under a
done under a threat of a fear of punishment and so Paul says
to us that God's children sees things differently by God's grace. We're motivated to preach Christ. We want to minister that hope
and that comfort that we've received from our God through his son,
Jesus Christ, and that's what we want to tell others. We want
to share what the Lord has taught us in our hearts and how he's
blessed us and how he set us free from the vain trappings
of religion and that hamster wheel of works to earn salvation
for ourselves. And so Paul said it like this,
also from 2 Corinthians 5, 14. He said, we thus judge that if
one died, then we're all dead. Meaning that if Christ died for
our sins, to put away our sins, well, that's true of every one
of his people. We're all sinners, and we all
need to hear this grace of God. And so I'm gonna take that word
and speak to others what he's done for me. Maybe I can't articulate
all the doctrines or always know the right verse to go to, but
I know what Christ has done for me. And I'm gonna declare that
to those that the Lord brings me in contact with. I'm gonna
speak of the grace of my God that he's shown to me and hope
that the Lord will take of that and bless the heart of the person
I'm speaking to. And so that's our motivation,
it's Christ. So in the next few verses, verse
five, we see how the Lord continues that teaching, stripping us of,
bringing us to see that what I do is not getting it done with
God, and it never will. I'm not gonna save myself. And then we see how the Lord
blesses us, he shows us, he teaches us the truth of Christ. He says, you know, the Lord teaches
us because he tells us, look at Isaiah 57 verse 16. He teaches us, but then he speaks
grace into our hearts, because he says, I will not contend forever.
I'm not going to constantly chastise you. Neither will I always be
wroth, for the spirit should fail before me and the souls
which I have made. And so there's coming a time
where the Lord brings us to behold. There always comes a time when
the Lord brings us to behold His grace and mercy for us in
the Lord Jesus Christ. And so that begins, that affects
us, that touches us, that motivates us, the love of Christ for us.
And so then we're motivated to minister that same grace to others.
Ephesians 4.29 says, let no corrupt communication proceed out of
your mouth. Don't bear false witness of the
Lord. Don't turn people to works and
to what they need to be doing, turn them to Christ. Don't let
corrupt words come out of your mouth, a false gospel. But that
which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto
the hearers. And when we were in Ephesians
chapter four, we saw that we're speaking and interacting with
people, our neighbors, our friends, our family members, according
to the grace that our God has shown us. Isn't that a relief? that you can just be, you can just speak according
to the grace and the kindness that your God has shown you.
You don't have to teach somebody anything or tell them what they
need to be fixing in their life. Remember how stressful that was
when you were in religion and you had to make sure you told
people how to live and you knew there was gonna be a confrontation?
Now you can preach Christ and just declare the glories of Christ
and what he's done for you. That's ministering grace to the
hearers. I've titled this message, A Teaching
Word. Last time we were here in Isaiah
58, it was a chastening word. Well, this is a teaching word. And so the people, verse three,
they had been making a big deal about their fast. And just to
make sure we understand, their fast was more than just denying
themselves of eating food. Their fast was bringing afflictions
on their selves. It was a religious work to deprive
themselves of something or to afflict themselves with something
in order to gain God's notice and attention or man's notice
and attention. And that's why they were asking,
why have we fasted and thou seest not? Why have we afflicted our
soul and thou takest no knowledge? And so they would pick a day
where they would deny themselves and afflict their souls, and
the Lord tells us in verse four, ye shall not fast as ye do this
day. And that's a word of grace to
his people. He's telling you, you're laboring
in darkness, you're walking in darkness, I'm gonna teach you.
I'm gonna teach you what a real fast is. I'm gonna teach you
what it is to walk by my grace. You're not going to fast the
way you do today. I'm going to bring you to a new
and living way by my son Jesus Christ. He's gracious to them.
It's written in the prophets, our Lord said, and they shall
be all taught of God. So what I wanna do with you in
looking at verse five is as we see what they were doing, let's
hear the words of our Lord. I'm gonna quote some words that
our Savior spoke when he was here in the flesh. We'll quote
what Christ says on these things, and then we'll hear the difference
between what we think in the flesh by nature and what our
Lord graciously teaches us from His Word. So our Lord begins
this teaching in verse 5. He asks them a question. Is it
such a fast that I have chosen? Is this my choice for you? A
day for a man to afflict his soul? And what the Lord is saying
is this is what you think is a fast? You set aside a whole
day? You carve out a little time in
which you're going to acknowledge me and worship me and seek me
one whole day. Wow. Is that what you think is
a fast unto the Lord? Well, our Lord Jesus Christ in
Luke 10, 27 said this. that God's children he says that
thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with
all thy soul and with all thy strength and with all thy mind
and thy neighbor as thyself and so we don't We don't worship
God by just carving out a little time for the Lord. That's religion. It's just saying, well, this
will be, I'll give this part to God and then I'm going to
just do my own thing and see things my own way. I'll just
do it once in a while. That's exactly that. That's the
affliction and the self-denial that the people were doing is,
hey, We're giving you a little part of ourselves. We've set
it aside. We've blocked it off. It's all
for you, in which we do this. Why aren't you noticing that?
Why aren't you noticing that? And we think that that's what
the Lord does. And then the rest of the time,
we just fill up and satisfy the lusts of our flesh, just doing
the things that please us, even though we know that they're not
pleasing to the Lord. And so we see by nature how hypocritical
we are by nature. We're not going to save ourselves.
We're full of hypocrisy and full of excuses. Our Lord said this. It says that he said to them
all in Luke 9, 23, if any man will come after me, let him deny
himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. It's a daily
walk. We're always looking to the Lord
Jesus Christ and rejoice in him, rejoice in what he's done for
us and be ready in season and out of season to declare to others
what Christ has done for you. May the Lord bless us to always
have our hearts and minds set upon him. And so our Lord then
asks them if in their fast they should appear as a bulrush. He asks, is it to bow down his
head as a bulrush? So I looked up what a bulrush
is. And a bulrush is a type of grass which grows in marshy or
wet lands. In this part of the world, typically
a bulrush looks like a cattail. It's got a firm, velvety kind
of head. It's thick and kind of a head
at the top. But they stand up pretty straight
and pretty strong as long as they're in water. But I did a
little digging, and I wanted to see, well, what is the bulrush
in that part of the country? What is in the mind of the the
prophet when he says this and so the bulrush that grows over
in that area is really papyrus it's what looks like papyrus
or what is used for papyrus or paper that the Egyptians used
and the way that bulrush forms is it puts up the head and it
puffs out. It gets a big head and it gets
puffy and then the wind comes and it bows itself down. It blows
over because it's catching all that wind. And so the picture
here is You have a puffed up head. You're full of pride. Your
head is just exploding, puffed up with knowledge and what you're
doing and you're trusting in the things that you're doing
and you're putting on a show. That's what he's saying to the
people. That's what we do. We get puffed up, we get proud
and arrogant and we think that we're doing something for the
Lord and that He should take notice and others should take
notice as well. So that we glory in self. We
glory in ourselves. And they even went so far as
to make their sacrifices a spectacle, to be seen. He says, you spread
sackcloth and ashes. And there's people to this day
in various religions who do things to make it obvious that they're
practicing some form of religion, whether they're putting ashes
on their forehead, or they're wearing some religious garb or
some piece. I've known, I remember working
with a guy in a factory many years ago who came in and showed
everybody his bloody elbows because he said he had prayed all night
and had rocked on the elbows for so long that he broke the
skin. And that was his reward. That
was his reward. He went and told everybody how
hard of a prayer he is. And so our Lord said in Matthew
6, 16 through 18, speaking to these things. Moreover, when
ye fast, be not as the hypocrites of a sad countenance, for they
disfigure their faces, that they may appear unto men to fast. Verily I say unto you, they have
their reward. But thou, when thou fastest,
anoint thine head, and wash thy face, that thou appear not unto
men to fast, but unto thy father which is in secret. And thy father,
which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly. And so our
Lord asks, wilt thou call this a fast, your afflictions of soul? Is this an acceptable day to
the Lord? And it sounds absurd when you
hear it out loud, because we do various things to get attention,
but when you hear it out loud and you see how the Lord speaks
of the heart that he gives to his child, you see how quickly
we we fall short and how hypocritical we are by nature. And so truly
we see how the Lord is our teacher. He is our wisdom and how dependent
we are on him to keep us and lead us. He said in John 8, 12,
then spake Jesus again unto them saying, I am the light of the
world. He that followeth me shall not
walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life. And so the
Lord teaches us that all our works, the things that we think
of naturally, are pleasing to God and what's right and good. what we need to be doing. Our
Lord has a way of teaching us, poking holes in them, stripping
us down so that we don't get that puffed up arrogant head
and begin to bite and devour our brethren who aren't doing
the things that we're doing. And to be gracious and understanding
and patient with others even as the Lord is patient and kind
to teach us and lead us along graciously. He says, we're led
by the Spirit and we were born again. We walk by faith and we
don't even do what Christ said. Who of us can stand here and
boast of having loved the Lord our God with all our heart, mind,
soul, and strength and our neighbor as ourselves? Who of us can say,
yeah, every day I pick up my cross daily and follow him? And we see, Lord, I'm ashamed. I'm not worthy of your name. Have mercy, Lord, keep me. And
that humbling helps us with dealing with others, to be gracious with
them and understanding with them. And so the thing is, is that
the Lord teaches his children truth. He grows us, he declares
truth in his word. He doesn't pull his punches.
He declares the truth and we hear it. But the Lord is gracious
in causing us to hear it. Because who can hear it? Who
wants to hear it? We've all declared the truth
of our salvation in Christ and that means that, what are you
saying? That my works count for nothing?
Yeah, that is what we're saying. Our works count for nothing.
We don't save ourselves. And The flesh hears that and
gets offended and pulls back. And the reason why is because
that's sin in us. John 3.19 I think is appropriate
here where Christ said, this is the condemnation. that light
is coming to the world. And men loved darkness rather
than light, because their deeds were evil. Everyone that doeth
evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his
deeds should be reproved. And that's where we all would
be by nature if left to ourselves. Verse 21, but he that doeth truth
cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest that
they are wrought in God. If I do anything good, If there's
anything that's pleasing to my Lord, it's all for Christ's sake. It's by His power and His grace,
and it's to His glory. It's to His glory. All right,
now, remember that how fasting here then is being likened to
self-denial and affliction. And our Lord shows us the folly
of our ways. And what he then does is he declares,
because he said, you're not going to fast like you do today. I'm
going to teach you what it is to fast. And so he gives us a
number of examples in verses 6 and 7. And so we hear these
in the new man. When our Lord, by grace, gives
us his Holy Spirit, and we are born from above, that's how we
hear. That's when we hear His words
and how and when we're taught of the Lord to look to Christ,
to trust in His blood, that His blood cleanses us from all sin.
We're not doing this to justify ourselves. We're not doing this
to sanctify ourselves. Whatever we do, we do because
the love of Christ constrains us. And the love of God dwells
in you, Christ said. That's how we look to Christ.
In Psalm 51 verse 6, David said, Behold thou desirest truth in
the inward parts, and in the hidden part thou shalt make me
to know wisdom. So the Lord teaches us, He shows
us what it is to fast. Now what we're going to see here
I would call this the ministry of reconciliation. This is what
we are called to do in terms of that ministry of reconciliation,
which Paul speaks of also in 2 Corinthians chapter 5. And
so, if you're going to be afflicted in that spiritual sense, it'll
be as a new and living creature. A new and living creature. All
right. Paul says, I'm sorry, our Lord says in verse six, Isaiah
58 verse six, is not this the fast that I have chosen for you,
my creation, my people? Is this not the fast that I've
given to you? And now he shows us first, he
says it's to loose the bands of wickedness. If false religion that Isaiah
is speaking of here, if this is wickedness, what we've seen
about man's fast is wickedness, well then what the Lord's saying
is don't teach people this falsehood. Don't keep preaching morality. And don't keep preaching and
focusing on the law. That only produces enmity in
the flesh. It produces a puffed up, vain,
thinking. It produces a harshness and a
hardness in the hearers. It doesn't produce love and hope
and faith and fellowship in the Lord. He says, loose the bands
of wickedness. So stop preaching that which
is lies and preach the good news of our God in the face of Jesus
Christ. Declare what He's done for sinners.
speak of how the Lord sent him in grace, and how he humbled
himself, and took upon him this flesh, and fulfilled all righteousness,
and put up with, and bore the sins, and the hatred, and the
enmity of his own creation against himself, and willingly went as
the Lamb of God, obedient to the Father for our sakes. to be our shorty and our substitute
and bear that wrath of God to put away our sin. He willingly
did that. for you, his people. Preach Christ. Don't preach fleshly
works. You better fix this. You've got
to start doing that. Make sure you stop that over
there and do this instead. No, loose the bands. Those things
are bondage. They're binding. And they lead
people to produce works of wickedness, evil works, iniquity. When you preach Christ, And he
forms love and faith and hope in the heart whereby we walk
and serve others. And we don't even see the works
that we're doing or the good that we're doing for others.
and being a comfort to them. So, losing the bands of wickedness
is to preach the good news of Christ. That's what sets men
free. Second, it's to undo the heavy
burdens. Stop whipping and beating the
sheep with the law of Moses. Don't keep laying on them burdens
and what they need to be doing. Declare Christ is our righteousness
and God is well pleased with him. and he's well pleased with
you who come to our God in Christ. He's the one who's delivered
us from the curse of the law so that we don't have our part
in Adam, and with the inhabitants of the world, we have our part
in the second Adam, the Lord Jesus Christ. Romans 7, verses
four through six says, wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become
dead to the law by the body. of Christ. We're in that body
of Christ. We're His. We're His people.
We're His beloved and partakers of His inheritance with the saints
in light. That ye should be married to
another. We're dead to the law that ye should be married to
another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should
bring forth fruit unto God. That's the power that we live
by now is of God. It's that same resurrection power
that raised Christ from the dead is the power that our God gives
to us by his spirit dwelling in you, raising us from spiritual
death. that we could hear, that we don't
go on in the ignorance of our dark ways, but walk now in the
light of Christ. For when we were in the flesh,
the motions of sins which were by the law did work in our members
to bring forth fruit unto death. We were stirred up with enmity,
we were stirred up with pride, we were stirred up with want
of reward, we were stirred up with trying to keep ourselves
out of hell, and all it did was bring forth dead fruits that
God said, Hypocrite, that's not salvation. You're not trusting
in me. You're producing fruits of your flesh. And he's delivered
us from that. But now we are delivered from
the law that being dead wherein we were held that we should serve
in newness of spirit and not in the oldness of the letter.
And so we're alive now by the spirit of God and we're led of
our savior, of his spirit. We're born of him and walk in
faith in him. Third, he says, it's to let the
oppressed go free and that ye break every yoke. Now, of myself, by me, looking
to me, I can't relieve you from your oppressors, from your accusers. I can't deliver you from your
fears, your worries, your anxieties, your stresses. I don't have that.
But I know one who can. I know one who does set free
his people and does speak comfort into the hearts of his people. It's the Lord Jesus Christ. The prophet wrote in Isaiah 61,
verses one through three, if you look there, Isaiah 61. This
is Christ, and our Lord, when He came in the flesh and He went
into that synagogue and He read these words, then sat down, closed
the book and sat down and said to the people, this day, these
words are fulfilled in your hearing. It's Christ who is the one who
sets us free. He says, Isaiah 61, one, the
spirit of the Lord God is upon me. Because the Lord hath anointed
me to preach good tidings unto the meek, he hath sent me to
bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives,
and the opening of the prison to them that are bound, to proclaim
the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our
God to comfort all that mourn. because believer, you who have
no righteousness of your own and look to Christ, the vengeance
of God was poured out on him and is turned away from you now
so that you stand and behold your God in the day of grace. In the day of grace and mercy
in Christ. to appoint unto them that morn
in Zion, not manufactured mourning, but true sorrow for their sin,
because the Lord has shown it to them, to give unto them beauty
for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise
for the spirit of heaviness, that they might be called trees
of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might be
glorified." And so we see this is all work of the Lord and we
are the fruit of His planting. We're brought by Him. Now look
at verse 7. He asks, is it not, is the fast
that I've given to you to do, is it not to deal thy bread to
the hungry so that Our Lord shows us that He is our very meat indeed. His flesh is meat indeed. His
blood is drink indeed. Our Lord tells us that He is
the bread from heaven. He is the sustenance, the life,
the nutrition, the salvation. Everything of our God is given
to us in His Son Jesus Christ who came from heaven to save
his people. John 6, 54 through 56, our Lord
said, whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal
life, and I will raise him up at the last day. We do that by
faith, looking to him, trusting that his blood makes me righteous. His blood makes me accepted with
God. I'm accepted only by the Lord
Jesus Christ. He's everything I need to stand
before God accepted of him. That's faith which he gives his
people looking to him and that is feeding on his flesh and drinking
his blood. For my flesh is meat indeed and
my blood is drink indeed. He that eateth my flesh and drinketh
my blood, he that believes in me dwelleth in me and I in him. And so he says, deal thy bread
to the hungry. Freely give what the Lord has
freely given you. Don't lay stumbling blocks and
raise up bars for people to jump over and set up fiery hoops for
them to jump through. Preach Christ. He freely gave
it to you, freely give it to them. And even though we spent
years in dead religion, and maybe they didn't, give it to them
freely. Give it to them freely and just
share with what the Lord gave to you. Next, our Lord says that
his fast is that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy
house. There's people out there that
are cast out by religion. They have no place. They don't
fit in. They ask questions and they ask the truth. And they
read it in the scriptures, and it gets the practitioners of
religion angry. They did that to the blind man
in John chapter 9. He didn't know much, right? He
didn't know much. He said, all I know is I was blind, and now
I see. And it was that man who did it
for me. He did it for me. And they hated him for it. And
it says, It says in verse John 9, 35 and 36, Jesus heard that
they had cast him out, and when he had found him, he said unto
him, dost thou believe on the Son of God? How can I be saved? Believe on the Son of God. Believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved. He answered
and said, who is he, Lord, that I might believe on him? And the
Lord showed him, it's me who talks to you. I'm the Lord, he
said. And so those who see the hypocrisy
of dead religion and dare to speak up about it, they're gonna
be hated. They're not gonna fit in, and eventually, if they keep
it up, they're gonna be kicked out and booted. When you find
them, when you meet them, and you come to know who they are,
invite them to come and hear the gospel. Ask them, come here,
just hear. Just hear the gospel. Just come
and sit and listen and feed upon Christ. That's all. Just bring
them to your house that they may be fed with that bread. Again,
he says, when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him. All right, our works and religion
are filthy rags. All you have to do is look at
us and you'll see the holes in our garment and you'll see our
nakedness. Our righteousness, our hope, our covering, our glorious
covering, our perfect fit covering is the righteousness of the Lord
Jesus Christ. To them, white robes were given
unto every one of them. That's our righteousness. And
then finally he says that thou hide not thyself from thine own
flesh. Remember what we are by nature. Every one of us has sinned and
come short of the glory of God. Don't hide yourself from your
own flesh. You're that wicked one. Don't be harsh and cruel
and mean to others and judge them and lay on them burdens
unnecessarily and turn them away from Christ. They're just like
you. And that's where we were when
the Lord came and saved us and was merciful to us. And so show
them that same mercy and kindness which the Lord has shown to you.
And you'll be doing that fast that the Lord says is acceptable
to him. And that's how we fast. It's
to not seek ourselves, it's to preach and declare Christ. Now, I began this message quoting
from 2 Corinthians 5, so let's just turn there and we see, I
said that this is the ministry of reconciliation, what's being
traced out here in verses six and seven. And so we read in
2 Corinthians 5, verses 14 through 18. For the love of Christ constraineth
us, because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then we're
all dead. And that he died for all, that
they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto
him which died for them and rose again. Wherefore henceforth,
from here forward, know we no man after the flesh, yea, though
we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know
we him No more. In other words, we were religious
in our flesh and we did religious things and thought we worshipped
Christ in our flesh, according to fleshly ways and fleshly things.
And we thought that was righteousness. But now, being born again, we
see and know that that's not. We didn't know the Lord then.
Now we know him, being born again of his spirit. Therefore, verse
17, if any man be in Christ, he's a new creature. Old things
are passed away. We don't fast the way we did
before, where we put on a show and try to do things that afflict
ourselves to get God's notice. That's old. It's passed away.
Behold, all things are become new. We fast now serving the
Lord. We speak of Christ. We preach
Christ and him crucified. And all things are of God who
hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ and hath given
to us the ministry of reconciliation. So that's what a fast is. A true
fast is just ministering that reconciliation that's been ministered
to you. That's the fast. That's the fast. I pray the Lord bless your hearts
and cause you to rejoice in his son because he's marvelous. He's
wonderful. He's a blessing. He's more of
a blessing than I'm able to describe him. Amen. All right, let's close
in prayer. Our gracious Lord, we thank you
for your grace and your mercy and how, Lord, how foolish we
are, how ignorant we are, how how often we walk in darkness
and in foolishness, but Lord, we thank you that you are the
God of all grace and your son, Jesus Christ, whom you've sent
to put away our sin that we may know you and hear your voice
and be taught of you and be brought out of dead religion and striving
in dead works and spending money on that which does not satisfy
and laboring on that which brings no relief. Lord, we thank you
for your son, Jesus Christ. What a precious, precious gift
you've given to us in him. Lord, put aside from us that
vain fleshly works that we trust in and get puffed up with pride
in doing. Lord, put them aside and reveal
your son in us. Fill us with Your Holy Spirit
and the power of Your resurrection. Raising Him from the dead, Lord,
raise us up from the dead. And fill us with Your Spirit.
Dwell in us and fill us with that love of Christ that constrains
us. That we would walk by faith. And in so doing, Lord, you bring
forth those works which you've prepared for us in Christ. And Lord, that we would not trust
in anything we do, but keep trusting in Christ unto the end. It's
in his name we pray and give thanks. Amen. Let's all stand and sing how
great thou art, number 37, how great thou art. O Lord my God, when I in awesome
wonder Consider all Thy hands have meant to me, I see the stars,
I hear the rolling thunder, Thy power throughout the universe
displayed. Then sings my soul, my Saviour
God, to Thee How great Thou art, how great Thou art Then sings
my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee How great Thou art, how great
Thou art When through the woods and forest
glades I wander And hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees
When I look down from lofty mountain grandeur And hear the brook and
feel the gentle breeze Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee
How great Thou art! How great Thou art! Then sings my soul, my Saviour
God, to Thee How great Thou art! How great Thou art! And when I think that God, His
Son not sparing, Sent Him to die, I scarce can take it in. That on the cross, my burden
gladly bearing, He bled and died to take away my sin. Then sings my soul, my Saviour
God, to Thee How great Thou art, how great Thou art Then sings
my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee How great Thou art, how great
Thou art When Christ shall come with shout
of acclamation, And take me home, what joy shall fill my heart! Then I shall bow in humble adoration,
And there proclaim, my God, how great Thou art! Then sings my
soul, my Saviour God, to Thee. How great Thou art! How great Thou art! Then sings my soul, my Saviour
God, to Thee. How great Thou art! How great
Thou art!