Good evening. All right, we'll
be in Isaiah 26. We'll be looking at the last
three verses, 19 through 21. Now tonight, we're gonna see
the blessings of the covenant of grace that God our Father
has established with God the Son, so that all the believers'
blessings, all his children, their blessings, are founded
upon Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ. Now, these blessings
begin for us in the promise of the resurrection, the promise
of the resurrection. And what I mean by that is first,
we experience the resurrection of grace, of grace, and then
we experience at a time appointed of God the Father, the resurrection
in glory, right, the glory. But first, we experience this
resurrection in grace, that God has purposed to save his people
by his son Jesus Christ, that he is our very righteousness. And so, once we're gathered into
that resurrection of grace, that'll be our primary focus tonight,
then we begin to experience the blessings that God has provided
for us. We have a knowledge of what he's
done for us, but not before then. Before we're made alive by his
grace, given his spirit and made alive in Christ, we don't know
or understand the things of God. All we are is flesh before then,
natural understanding. We don't even understand the
depth of our sin if we even see or understand that we ourselves
are sinners. All right, but once God comes
to us in grace and gives us life, raises us from our death, that
spiritual death, then we begin to know him and what he has done
and accomplished for us. And that leads us into the many
blessings that we have in Christ. Now, I want us to see tonight
that Christ is our hiding place. He's the one that God has provided
for us. He is our hiding place, and he's
the one that provides to us comfort and peace and joy and rest, even
in the midst of the storm of judgment coming down upon the
people around us, a judgment which we experience, though not
like the wicked experiences that judgment. Our title is Come My
People. Come, my people. And first, we'll
be looking at the promise of the resurrection, and then we'll
see the provision, the provision made for us in the chambers. That is what God calls us into,
the chambers, okay? So, let's begin here with this
promise of the resurrection. The word of God teaches that
there is a resurrection for all. There is a general resurrection
which everyone Believers and non-believers shall experience,
they shall be raised by God. In John chapter 5 verses 28 through
29, our Lord has been telling his hearers about the resurrection
of grace. He was telling them that all
that are dead are going to hear the voice of the Son of God.
And he affirms that he has authority and power to do this, to raise
people, to give them spiritual life in himself. He affirms his
power in this first resurrection, right? Our spiritual birth is
our first resurrection, that's our first being raised from the
dead, because we're spiritually dead, right? He declares He shows
that he has authority to do this in declaring that he has the
authority to raise us physically as well. So in John 5, 28, it
says, marvel not at this, that I raise my people spiritually
from spiritual death. Don't marvel at that because
the hour is coming in the which all that are in the grave shall
hear his voice and shall come forth, they that have done good
unto the resurrection of life. and they that have done evil
unto the resurrection of damnation." Alright, now, the resurrection,
the talk of the resurrection has always been a point of contention. It's always been a point that's
been mocked by those that are spiritually dead, those that
have no knowledge of God. They mock the resurrection. That
was Paul's experience when he preached the gospel and when
he spoke of the resurrection, the Greeks mocked him. It says
in Acts 17.32, when they heard of the resurrection of the dead,
some mocked. Another said, we will hear thee
again of this matter. although there's no record of
them ever hearing him again of the matter. Now, the spiritually
dead of this world, they mock the resurrection. And the reason
why they mock the resurrection is because they don't want to
believe it. Because if there is a resurrection, that means
there is a God who is our judge, with whom we have to do. A God
that judges the thoughts and the hearts and the intents of
men and their actions, what they do and what they say. So the
wicked don't want to think about a resurrection because then they're
going to stand before God who will judge them. And the children
of God, they rejoice in the resurrection because that's our inheritance.
We shall be raised and we shall enter into our inheritance in
Christ, which we have even now by faith. We have it by faith,
our understanding of Christ. And so, this, by faith, we enter
into the many spiritual blessings that we have in Christ, which
we have received of God. And we experience these blessings
in the chambers, which we'll see what the chambers are in
a little bit. Now, our text It begins here
in Isaiah 26, verse 19, and this is either the Father speaking
to the Son in the first portion of it, or it's the Son speaking
to the church throughout. It says, Isaiah 26, verse 19,
thy dead men shall live. Now, in either case, whether
it's God the Father or God the Son, this is the Godhead establishing
the covenant of grace for his people." He's affirming this
promise, thy dead men shall live. And then it continues with the
son speaking, again either in answering the father or in declaring
to us this blessing, he says, together with my dead body shall
they arise. And so our Lord is establishing
here that not only will there be a general resurrection, but
there's going to be a resurrection of the just, of those made just,
those justified in Christ, those accepted of God in Christ because
they are righteous in Christ. There will be a resurrection
for them. So this is first the resurrection
in grace and then follows at some point the resurrection in
glory. Now, before we're ever raised
to glory, our Lord is pleased to raise us in grace. we saw this but or rather I should
say there's other prophets that speak of this resurrection. It's not just Isaiah but other
prophets were shown this of God that and spoke of this resurrection
of our grace. So Ezekiel was another prophet. Ezekiel also prophesied of this
resurrection of grace. And he showed that salvation
is an operation upon the people by God. It's an operation of
grace, that He works in His people, that He does for us who are sinners,
because we can't do this operation. We can't do the things that save
us. There's nothing we do that saves
us. The work of salvation is of the
Lord. It's His work, and it's a work
that He freely does by grace, for the sinner. And this was
seen, we see this in Ezekiel, in the Valley of Dry Bones. Most
of us have all heard of the Valley of Dry Bones, and that's a picture
of grace, of how God saves by grace. It's in Ezekiel 37 if
you wanted to see it. Ezekiel 37 verse 12 is where
will pick up. This is where the prophet was
commanded of God to prophesy to the dry bones. These were
just dry, dead bones. There was no flesh on them. And
when he prophesied, it says bone came to bone, and then sinews
were laid on the bone, and then flesh on the sinews in the bone,
and then skin upon that. And then the Lord told him to
prophesy again, and he prophesied and breath came into them, which
pictures like what we saw last week with Isaiah, which when
he spoke of the wind, right, the wind that we brought forth,
wind, that is of ourselves, vanity, but of the Lord, that's how we
speak in grace when we cry out to him for mercy, begging him
for grace and to save us, to have compassion and mercy upon
us. That's all his work coming forth,
that fruit comes from us, but it's of his work, and the new
man, he brings that out so that we cry out to him and seek him
for mercy, all right? So, Ezekiel's been prophesying
this, and it continues in verse 12, where he says, therefore,
Ezekiel 37, 12, therefore, prophesy and say unto them, thus saith
the Lord God, behold, O my people, I will open your graves and cause
you to come up out of your graves and bring you into the land of
Israel. ye shall know that I am the Lord
when I have opened your graves O my people and brought you up
out of your graves and shall put my spirit in you and ye shall
live and I shall place you in your own land then shall you
know that I the Lord have spoken it and performed it, saith the
Lord." And so we see here a picture of our resurrection of grace.
Now, of course, it also pictures our resurrection in glory, but
we see here how the Lord has given us life from these dead
bodies that can produce no fruit, nothing living, nothing of grace
in themselves. They're just graves, they're
just a tent. if you will, and the Lord raises
us up from this dust and brings us forth in life, in spiritual
life, that He has worked in us, alright? So, this is what our
Lord meant in John 5, 25, when He said, Verily, verily, I say
unto you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall
hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear shall
live. He's talking about grace. And
so every sinner that is chosen of God by His love and mercy
and election, they hear the voice of the Son of God. Not audibly,
we don't hear Christ speaking audibly, but we hear Him in His
Word. We hear Him, the truth of what
He's saying. the conviction to know that I
am a sinner, I need his grace and mercy, so that we're brought
to see I can't save myself, my works don't save me. God has
provided salvation in his son, Jesus Christ, who says, come,
you that are sinners, come, come to the waters of life and drink
freely. God has provided his son to save
sinners, to deliver them from their death in themselves. All
right? In our text, we see that after
receiving the promise, this promise that we shall be raised first
in grace and then in glory, our Lord declares what the fruit
of this gracious operation is. Let's look at Isaiah 26 verse
19 again. Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body
shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell
in dust." So this is the fruit of grace, right? There shall
be a spiritual awakening in his people. He doesn't leave us in
darkness. He reveals to us our need and
He shows us that Christ and Christ alone is the one that satisfies
that need. And He gives us life and He fills
us with His Spirit, right, so that we see, we hear, the voice
of Christ, we hear his voice in salvation, we see that he
is indeed our salvation that God has provided, so that we
believe. He gives us faith. He works that
gift of faith in us whereby we believe God and what he's done
for us. We trust him and believe him.
He is my righteousness. So that we cease working for
our righteousness. And what we do from then on is
done in thankfulness. not to earn anything with God,
but because we're thankful for what God has done for us. And
then we shall speak to others of this gracious work. It shall
be on our tongues. We shall speak as those that
have been touched and raised to life in grace. We'll stop
boasting of our works, we'll stop talking about what we've
done for God, and we'll start speaking of what he's done for
us. It may be broken, it may be soft, but the Lord teaches
us so that we speak it and we stand by our Lord to glorify
His name, even to the point where it becomes a beautiful song of
what He's done for us. Now, the apostle also speaks
of the awakening of believers in Christ. Turn over to Ephesians
2. When he was writing to them,
he speaks of this resurrection of grace as well. In Ephesians
2, we'll start in verse 4. He said, but God who is rich
in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us. That's
in spite of us being sinners. under the prince of the power
of the air and just walking in darkness and in death. But God,
who's rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved
us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together
with Christ. By grace, ye are saved. This
is the believer's first resurrection. We were dead in trespasses and
sins, and yet Christ, for his love raised us anew, gave us
life in himself. Now look at verse six. And hath
raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places
in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come he might show the
exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through
Christ Jesus. All right, so that even now we
are raised from the dead from our spiritual death in Adam,
We died there in the garden, we had no kind of fellowship
with God, no understanding of Him, but now, by the mercies
of our God, shown to us through His Son, Jesus Christ, we have
the Spirit, whereby we know and understand the things of God.
Not only that we were bankrupt, lost, helpless sinners who couldn't
save ourselves, and not only that, that Christ is salvation,
but we see that in Him we have all the comforts, the joy, the
peace of God, which teaches us, and He's the one who passes that
understanding whereby we know Him, and we understand more and
more what He's doing, both in us and in the earth, because
we cease looking to this earth for joy and comfort and peace,
and we understand that God is working his will. He's doing
his will in earth just as he does in heaven. All right, so
now this being awake and where we sing of his grace, Paul spoke
of this too. He spoke of this as our ministry. This is the ministry of the church
in support and in defense of the gospel. because we know Christ
is the way. He's the truth. He's the life.
He's the only way to the Father. There's no other name under heaven
given among men whereby we must be saved. It's Christ. And this
is that ministry because it's in Christ, the mediator, sent
of God. That's how sinners are reconciled
to God. And so our ministry comes to
declaring this. Paul said to the Corinthians
in the second letter in chapter four, verse 13, He said, we,
having the same spirit of faith, according as it's written, I
believed, and therefore have I spoken, we also believe, and
therefore speak. This is what we speak, this is
what we defend, this is what we're declaring here, is this
beautiful gospel of what Christ has done for us. This is the
song of the redeemed, this is what the redeemed sing, they
sing of their redemption in Christ and their reconciliation in Christ,
being made alive. These are them from every kindred,
tongue, people, and nation. This is what our God has done
for us. All right, now our Lord also
adds another phrase here in Isaiah 26, verse 19. The end of the
verse there says, for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the
earth shall cast out the dead. Now dew is that little formation
of droplets, those little droplets of water that form on the stem
and as the plant begins to grow on the leaves and it gently waters
the ground in the spring and it helps to grow the herbs. It helps to make them grow up
and to be strong and to be established in the ground and so he likens
this to dew, right, and it's especially effective in the spring
when, say, herbs that have been growing in your garden, they're
dead, they just look like dead sticks in your ground, but then
that heat comes in and the water begins to condensate on them
and then it waters them and they spring to life in the springtime
and it's really beautiful. But this dew is not the dew,
not the word flesh. It doesn't come forth from us. It doesn't begin with us. We don't have any power or ability
to know or please God. There's nothing in the deadness
of us. It's of the Lord. So the Lord must do this. Job said, who can bring a clean
thing out of an unclean? Not one. It's like going into
the garage when your hands are dirty with oil and you grab an
oily rag and you try cleaning your hands and all you're doing
is rubbing more oil on your hands. We can't bring a clean thing
out of an unclean thing because we're filthy already. So this
dew, he says, is as the dew of herbs. And this is Christ's blood. This is Christ's spirit. It's
his blood doing the work here of growing us. It's the scent
of His power, His love, and His grace that gives life to His
people. It's because of His redeeming
grace that we are brought to life. That's the dew, the dew
of herbs. It's the blood of Christ that
gives us life in Him. Turn over to Job 14. Job 14. I thought this, I wish I could
have read more, but for time I can't read it all. But Job
14, and go to verse seven, it says, for there is a hope
of a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and
that the tender branch thereof will not cease, though the root
thereof wax old in the earth, and the stalk thereof die in
the ground, yet through the scent of water it will bud. and bring
forth boughs like a plant." And that's what Christ's blood applied
to the sinner does. It brings forth life. The scent,
the sweet savor of Christ brings forth that life of the dead sinner. Just like that dead tree there.
It gives life in him. Alright, so in summary, first
is the resurrection of grace, then shall be the resurrection
of glory. Let's move on to our next point,
this provision that's provided for us in the chambers. Here we have a beautiful invitation
of our God. Now, it's not an invitation to
all. That word's been abused many times by religion, but it's
to the very people in Christ, those who have no hope in themselves,
those that are sinners, those that need the Lord Jesus Christ,
that hear his voice. It's not an invitation to be
refused, but rather a taking of the hand and a leading of
God into the chambers. It's all his work, sweetly grabbing
you and bringing you to himself so that we willingly go and gladly
go into these chambers. And it says there in verse 20,
Isaiah 26, 20, come my people. Enter thou into thy chambers
and shut thy doors about thee. Hide thyself, as it were, for
a little moment until the indignation be overpassed. Now, we see here
a pattern that we see in the scriptures, what the Lord has
done for his people throughout the Old Testament and the New
Testament of what he does. And as we've seen in Isaiah,
there's a pattern that we see, a pattern of judgment that the
Lord brings. He deals with the wickedness
of men. He's working his will, and so
kingdoms come. and kingdoms go. Kingdoms come
and kingdoms go, and the Lord is the one bringing this all
about, and he's the one leading and teaching his people through
all of this pattern of judgment that we see. And I say that because
judgment, when it comes upon the land, it comes upon all that
are there in the land, all experience it, all go through that judgment.
But even though the people of God are called to go through
that judgment, right, are experiencing it to a degree, they have the
mercy and the grace of God to flee to. The wicked don't have
that. They experience the judgment
without the grace and the mercy and the compassion of God. But
you that are His, being taught of Him, being led by Him, are
driven to the chambers, to those sweet promises that we have of
God there in the chambers, so that when the judgment's coming
down, we're not alone. The Lord's with us. The Lord
is ever with us to comfort us and keep us, to provide for us
and protect us. So the Lord, the wicked don't
have anything like that. So these chambers, they're not
like secret hiding places that deliver us from the experience
of what's coming upon all the people. And you know that in
this life, we sorrow, we suffer, we have afflictions, we have
pains and trials and tribulations. We go through these things as
well, but we have the Lord, right? We have the Lord. And an example
of this, you know, because you might be saying, you know, how
is this that we experience this judgment? And maybe there's confusion
in the word of it, because I don't mean that there's wrath and punishment
for us, but there's wrath and punishment for the wicked, for
sure. But Ezekiel said in Ezekiel 21
3, it says, say to the land of Israel, thus saith the Lord,
behold, I am against thee, and will draw forth my sword out
of his sheath, and will cut off from thee the righteous and the
wicked. So the judgment will come upon
the land, the people there in the land. So what do these chambers
represent for us in Christ? What do they mean for us in Christ? And I've hinted to it a little
earlier, but we, for example, have the comfort and the peace.
of God our Father who's ordained peace for us. It's His purpose
to show us peace in His Son, Jesus Christ. He provided Him
for this peace and He chose us so that in Christ we have no
fear of the second death, right? When all are resurrected, when
all are raised and stand before God in judgment, the second death,
it says, has no power over those who took part in the first resurrection. The first resurrection being
that resurrection in grace. He promises that. There's nothing
for you and I that hope in Him to fear. We have no fear. So
even though we died, just like everyone else, we have no fear
of that second death. It has no power over us. We shall
not be cast into the lake of fire with the devil and all those
who worship and follow his his will and do his bidding. But
we know that God rules and reigns over all things, and we'll see
that. We'll see that because we know
him. He drives us into the chamber
with that understanding, into Christ, knowing that our God
rules and reigns and is working his will in the earth. and that
we shall see his glory as it purposes him, whatever fruit
we have to bear, we shall see him working that out and giving
him all the thanks and the praise and the glory for it. You may
see terrible things, but you'll also see wondrous mercies and
grace of the Lord as well, things that will bring forth and draw
from us praise, right? Now, we've also been given, in
these chambers, we see and are shown how we've been given an
interest. in the person of Christ. He's
given us that need of Christ and His righteousness. We know
His blood cleanses us from all sin. We know that He is our righteousness. He's the robe of our covering,
that in Him we stand complete and accepted before God. And so we can go to Him. We can go to the Father and cry
out to Him and pray to Him and seek Him for mercy, right? And we have The Spirit of God,
whose presence comforts us and instructs us and keeps us ever
looking to Christ, will see His power worked out and displayed
in us. And that's what we saw even,
I think it was last week, when we saw where it says, Lord, in
trouble have they visited thee. They poured out a prayer when
thy chastening was upon them. Right? So the Spirit is the one
teaching us that even through the troubles, even through the
trials, even through whatever it is that we're called to go
through, it brings us to cry out to the Lord and He hears
us. Unlike the wicked who may call out to God, but they weren't
interested in the Day of Grace, they had no interest, they had
no thought of Him, and He tells them in His Word that He won't
hear them in the Day of Trouble. He'll mock them in the Day of
Trouble, but you that believe Him now, He hears you. He hears you, and what He does,
He does for our good. All right, so in the chambers
of our God, we have revealed to us the beauty of Christ. We see our husband and what he's
done for us, even in the shelter in the time of evil. Now, turn
over to Genesis, Genesis 6, because I want you to see a sweet picture
in this. If you go to Genesis 6, you might
recall, oh, this is Noah. This is where the Lord speaks
of destroying the earth. In Genesis 6, go to verse 17
and 18. The Lord speaking says, And behold,
I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth to destroy
all flesh, wherein is the breath of life from under heaven, and
everything that is in the earth shall die. But with thee will
I establish my covenant, and thou shalt come into the ark,
thou and thy sons, and thy wife and thy son's wives with thee."
Now go over to Genesis 7. Genesis 7 and drop down to the
end of verse 16. This is after Noah and his family
went into the ark and all the animals that the Lord brought
to Noah, they were in the ark. And we read that, the Lord shut
him in. Verse 17, and the flood was 40
days upon the earth and the waters increased. and bear up the ark,
and it was lift up above the earth." Now, Christ is our ark. Christ is our ark. And as the
ark was lift up above the earth there, upon those waters of judgment,
that ark was lift up, and Noah and his family, they all went
through the judgment, they were there in the judgment being poured
out upon God from above and beneath, but they were protected in the
ark. The ark bore that, bore that
wrath, and they were safe there in that chamber, in that ark
chamber. And we see in that a sweet picture
of how the Lord, the Lord's people were in Him. They were beared
up in Him. They were lifted up in Christ.
And I say that because He Himself said in John 12, verse 31 and
32, he said, now is the judgment of this world. Now shall the
prince of this world be cast out and I, if I be lifted up
from the earth, will draw all men unto me. So judgment is coming,
right? Judgment is falling upon the
earth. But Christ, in Christ, we're
lifted up from the earth. We're lifted up in that judgment,
protected in Him, safe in Him. And our Lord loves His people. He's provided a shelter for them
in the storm. And so whatever the judgment
is, we flee to Christ. Whatever that judgment is that's
coming upon the earth in our day, as well as the judgment
day in the end when everyone stands before Him. They that
have done good unto the resurrection of life, and they that have done
evil unto the resurrection of damnation. But He's provided
His Son for us, as we've been seeing in Isaiah 25 and 26, a
feast of fat things. He's provided His Son of wines
on the lees. He's provided richly for us to
abundantly feed upon Him, to go to Him, the Mediator, the
Savior of His people. the deliverer from us going into
that second death in the judgment. And so he provides that covering
for his people and all who trust Christ for righteousness, who
have no confidence in the flesh, in their works in the flesh,
but believe God that Christ was provided for this very purpose,
that he is their righteousness. He is the means of our forgiveness.
He's the propitiation for our sins. We have in Him the promise
of eternal life in Christ, because God's pleased with us now in
His Son. But understand, judgment is coming. Judgment is coming upon the earth. And so the Lord's Word to you
that hear, to you that hear and know that judgment is coming,
get to Christ, get to Christ, flee to him. That's the chambers
that God has provided for his people. He says there in verse
21, for behold, the Lord cometh out of his place to punish the
inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity. The earth also
shall disclose her blood and shall no more cover her slain. So our God has his purpose in
destroying the earth. it's going to come to an end.
It has a time when the Lord will wrap it all up like a scroll,
it'll all be rolled up and done away with. And so everything
we see, all the works going on in the earth, it's all just marching
towards that final day of judgment when the wicked will be judged
for their sin and their iniquity. But you that are hidden in Christ,
you that flee to Christ, there's nothing to fear, there's nothing
to be afraid of because of the promise that we have in God. We've been raised by his grace,
we shall be raised in glory to the resurrection of the just. He says, remember verse 20, it
said, come my people, enter thou into thy chambers and shut thy
doors about thee, Hide thyself, as it were, for a little moment,
until the indignation be overpassed. So I'll just close with this
one verse in John 16, 33. He said this to his disciples
then, and he says that to his disciples now. He said, these
things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation. but be of good cheer, I have
overcome the world. So I'm thankful for the grace
and the mercy of our God and his son, Jesus Christ. Keep looking
to him, flee to him, brethren. It's not by our works of righteousness
that we're accepted of him, it's Christ. And we have that blessed
assurance in him. So you rest there in him, whatever
trouble, whatever the tribulation, whatever the trial or the sorrow,
you flee to the chamber. Christ that God has provided
us and all the rich promises that we have in him He's provided
for you, and there's nothing to fear you you rest in him all
right. Let's pray Our gracious Lord
we thank you father that you have Beared up your people in
Christ our ark that you have lifted us up above the earth
Lord I even upon the judgment waters, Lord, that we are safe
and protected and kept in Him and we have all the promises
of our God. Lord, that you provide for us
so richly, so abundantly. Lord, help us, turn us from ourselves
and bring us, lead us to that rich feast in Christ that you
provided for your people. Lord, keep us ever feeding upon
Him, that we would eat his flesh and drink his blood, the bread
and the wine of our life, which is Christ. Lord, we thank you
for that feast. We thank you for your provision
of grace and ask that you would keep leading us and turning us
to what you've provided for us in Christ. Lord, that even when
we see judgment falling upon the inhabitants of this earth,
Lord, that we would ever be turned and flee to the chambers which
you've provided, that we would shut ourselves in there and wait
till the indignation be overpassed. Lord, teach us these things.
Teach us what this means. Lord, let us see your grace,
your power working in us. We pray this in Christ's name,
our Lord and Savior. Amen.