Good evening. All right, turn
to Isaiah 15. Our text will be looking at the
chapter of Isaiah 15, verses 1 through 9. And we'll also be
looking at some verses in 16. So the text is from Isaiah 15,
1 through Isaiah 16, 1. And we now, for these two chapters,
they cover the burden of Moab. The burden of Moab. And Moab
is a picture of the sinner in darkness. That sinner who trusts
in his or her own works, they're in darkness and they're in rebellion
against God because God has revealed his truth to us. He's revealed that he himself
is God, that he created us, and that he is the life giver, and
that he is the light giver, and he alone has truth and life in
him, and we're to seek him. And tonight we'll see that the
Lord sends a word of solemn warning by the mouth of his prophet Isaiah,
and it's to warn Moab of impending judgment. which is coming upon
them, the rebellious sinner, who are trusting in their own
works. And it comes because man looks to and trusts in his own
works rather than the salvation that God has provided in his
Son, Jesus Christ. Our title is Delivered from Darkness. Delivered from Darkness. And we'll first look at the certainty
of the rebels' destruction and then we'll see the certainty
of Christ's salvation. So let's look here at the certainty
of the rebel's destruction. Our text opens in Isaiah 15.1
saying, The burden of Moab, because in the night R of Moab is laid
waste and brought to silence. Because in the night Kier of
Moab is laid waste and brought to silence. Now as I mentioned
before, Moab is a picture of the rebellious sinner. And like
all sinners, Moab is in darkness, utter darkness. And that's because
it's a picture of us sinners who are in darkness. We are dead
in trespasses and sins and there's nothing but spiritual death in
us in Adam, in our father Adam. And our sin reflects that spiritual
darkness. We commit sin, we drink sin like
we drink water because we are spiritually dead and we don't
know what pleases God. We don't know what makes God
angry. We don't know how to worship
Him. We don't know Him at all. In
fact, listen to what Paul said in Acts 17 verses 26 and 27. He is speaking to the Athenians,
and he says, God hath made of one blood all nations of men,
for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined
the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation. that they should seek the Lord,
if happily they might feel after him and find him, though he be
not far from every one of us." So while God is near, he is the
creator, and he's in all things, while he's near, man is blind,
he's in utter darkness, so that he cannot see the kingdom of
God, right? And that sounds like what Christ
said, except a man be born again, except he be regenerated and
made alive by the Spirit and the power of God, he can't even
see the Kingdom of God. Now for a long time, the Lord
left the Moabites to themselves, just like many sinners. Like
Esau, God left Esau to his own works, to himself, so Moab was
left to themselves. And it says in Jeremiah 48, And
I'll reference a couple verses from Jeremiah 48 if you want
to turn there and then put a mark there. But in Jeremiah 48 11,
it says this, that Moab hath been at ease from his youth.
he hath settled on his leaves, and hath not been emptied from
vessel to vessel, neither hath he gone into captivity, therefore
his taste remained in him, and his scent is not changed. There had been no mixing in Moab,
he was left to himself for a long time, and so his taste He had
no difference. He had the taste that he had
when he was young and the scent that he had when he was young
remained in all his descendants in him. But now the Lord, he
raises up a prophet and he burdens this prophet in his heart with
the word of the Lord, a burden for Moab. And so Isaiah is raised
up to the Lord and he warns Moab of a coming judgment, of the
coming judgment of God upon them. And he also tells them, though,
that there is salvation. There is salvation in the Lord
Jesus Christ. And that's exactly a picture
of what the gospel preacher is sent to do. We warn the people
of coming judgment. We're letting the people know
that the Lord is angry and his wrath will be poured out upon
the wicked. but He's provided the means of
salvation in His Son, Jesus Christ. And we urge men and women to
flee to the Lord Jesus Christ, get to Him, because He alone
is the one means of salvation that God has provided. They are
to flee to the Lord Jesus Christ and take shelter. And so, I pray
that we all hear this word and that if our sin is preventing
us from trusting the Lord, that the Lord break that hold and
that iniquity that has us bound in that sin, that we would see
our need of Christ and run to Him, that we would flee to Him
for our safety and our shelter. All right, so these verses in
Isaiah 15, what we have here is a description of what man
takes comfort in. This is a description of all
that Moab found security and comfort and strength in. and
the Lord picks these things apart and he's going to take them all
apart by bringing them into ruin and bringing them into destruction
except they flee, except they hear his word and flee to the
Lord Jesus Christ. And so it is with the sinner
that Even we who have believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, we've
been shown the things that we trust in in our flesh, that which
comforted us, that which was our security. The Lord strips
the believer of these comforts and these strengths that we might
find our all in the salvation he's provided in his son, Jesus
Christ. So he does that in grace and
in mercy. But if we will not hear him,
will all come into destruction. Every sinner will be destroyed
if they face God in their own works and in what they trust
in. It says, if you remember, in Isaiah 3, verses 10 and 11,
say ye to the righteous that it shall be well with him, for
they shall eat the fruit of their doings. We may feel the same
stripping and the same things that are coming upon the
wicked, but it's going to be for our good. The Lord's going
to turn our hearts to Him. to trust in him and be delivered
from the coming wrath. But to the wicked, he says, Woe
unto the wicked, it shall be ill with him, for the reward
of his hands shall be given him." Alright, so let's look at these
descriptions, and the wicked, they're going to be utterly dismayed
and terrified by these things as they're being stripped away
and pulled apart, but the righteous though they tremble, they'll
seek their refuge in the Lord. They'll seek Him for their strength
and their comfort in Him. All right, so let's look at verse
1 here again. The burden of Moab, because in
the night, R of Moab is laid waste and brought to silence,
because in the night, Kier of Moab is laid waste and brought
to silence. So R and Kier, these are chief
cities in Moab. This is the seat of their pride.
They're very proud of these cities and the greatness of these cities.
So that as long as these cities remain, as long as these remain
as the chief cities and the seat of their administration and the
seat of their power and the seat of their pride, they go on in
their pride, in their arrogance and in their darkness. They're
not disturbed or troubled at all. And it says in Isaiah 16,
6, Isaiah 16, 6, we have heard of the pride of Moab. He's very
proud, even of his haughtiness and his pride and his wrath.
But his lies shall not be so. So this description is, in the
night, and in the night these cities are laid waste. And that
begins to describe the condition of us as sinners. We're in the
night, we're in darkness, and we are laid waste. Our works
are waste. Our works of righteousness, our
religious works, they're a waste in that they're dumb, and they're
to no profit. They don't profit us with God
at all. He's not looking to us just to
be religious. And sinners who are very religious
have a tendency to be very proud and very comfortable in their
works and what they're doing, especially when they begin to
compare themselves with other sinners. And they say, well,
at least I'm not as bad as that person over there. Or they look
at their cousin in the family or somebody and they say, well,
at least I'm not as bad off. As that person, I'm certainly
doing much better than they are. And so they're proud, we are
proud as sinners, proud in utter darkness. What that means for
proud sinners is that they don't see the coming of God's judgment. It takes them suddenly and it
takes them unaware and as a surprise when everything begins to fall
apart and come down around them. Turn over to 1 Thessalonians
5. 1 Thessalonians 5 verses 2 through
4. There's a difference. There is
a difference that the Lord makes between the children of wrath
and the children of grace. 1 Thessalonians 5 2. For yourselves know perfectly
that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night. For
when they shall say, Peace and safety, then sudden destruction
cometh upon them as travail upon a woman with child, and they
shall not escape. But ye, brethren, are not in
darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. go over to Romans 3, Romans 3.10,
we see that this describes, this darkness describes our condition,
that is our ruin and sin. And look at Romans 3.10-12, and
this describes us as sinners, what we are by
nature, and how God sees us, what God says that we are. Not
what we think of ourselves and what we think we're doing, but
as God sees it. Romans 3.10, as it is written,
there is none righteous, no, not one. There is none that understand
it. There is none that seeketh after
God. They are all, all gone out of
the way. They are together become unprofitable.
There is none that doeth good, no, not one. That's the testimony
of God concerning us as men and women, as sons and daughters
of Adam. That's how we come forth from
the womb, liars speaking lies and doing that which we think
is right and feeling proud and good about what we do. But God
doesn't see it as a good work. He says we're not even seeking
Him. We're not even trying to find him. We're so comfortable
in our own works and what we do. And so the description in
our text is that the cities are laid waste, and they're a picture
that there's none righteous. None of us has it together. None of us is doing what is right
before the Lord God by nature. And it's that they're brought
to silence, it says. And that silence is from man.
The Lord, his ear is open. and there's no one here on earth
that's seeking him, and none that are trying to find him out
and trying to please the true and living God. In Isaiah 59,
verses 1 and 2, it says, Behold, the Lord's hand is not short.
that it cannot save, neither his ear heavy, that it cannot
hear. But your iniquities, your sins,
have separated between you and your God, and your sins have
hid his face from you, that he will not hear." So it's our sin,
right? And it's our sin that prevents
us from having that relationship with the Lord. Just like when
Adam sinned, that was the death of the fellowship that he had
with God, and he died spiritually, and all his posterity in him,
so that now we're the ones who won't even seek the Lord. We
might pray, but we're praying to a God of our own imagination. You know, because of that, because
of our deadness and darkness, people say a lot of foolish things
out there in the world. Sometimes I look on news sites
where you can actually comment. A lot of them, they don't even
let you comment because they don't want to hear what you have to say back to
them. But sometimes I read an article
and on certain ones you can comment and I'll read down a little bit
and you can't get more than 12 comments before somebody is commenting
about God and about Jesus and usually It's either wrong, just
flat out wrong. Sometimes they just say a verse,
and that's maybe not that bad, but a lot of times they are speaking
in a derogatory way, in a way in which they drag Christ's name
through the mud. And the article has nothing even
to do, it seems like. It's not even a religious article
in nature or anything like that, and yet they're always looking
to take every shot they can against the truth. But when trouble begins,
right, when everything falls apart for people, that's when
they begin to get religious. And they turn to the God of their
own imagination and they cry out to God and seek Him for mercy. And that's what we have here
in verses 2 and 3. Isaiah 15, 2 and 3. It says,
He, He has gone up. This is speaking of Moab, because
Moab, that pronoun there, sometimes it uses the the plural, but in
this passage it also uses the singular because Moab as one
body, as one body of Antichrist, one body of sinners, which is
what we all were in Adam, one body of sin, We're all sinners. We're all guilty of sinning against
the true and living God. And it says, he has gone up to
Bajeth. As one day went up to Bajeth and to Dibon, the high
places, to weep, Moab shall howl over Nebo and over Medeba, and
on all their head shall be baldness and every beard cut off. In their
streets they shall gird themselves with sackcloth. On the tops of
their houses and in their streets, everyone shall howl, weeping
abundantly. And so these high places are
where they worship their false god, which was called Chimosh.
Chimosh. Now look over in Isaiah 16, 12,
and it continues with this. It says Isaiah 16, 12, and it
shall come to pass when it is seen that Moab is weary on the
high place. They warn themselves out seeking
after God, that he shall come to a sanctuary to pray, but he
shall not prevail. Not prevail. And so that's a
word to those, you probably know some people, but many parents
might say this to their kids at some point, but they encourage
you just to believe something. Believe anything. As long as
you believe something, just have faith. And you see that in movies
and on the TV and people talk about having faith as though
faith is some kind of magical pixie dust that's going to help
make everything better. But that's a lie. We're to believe
the true and living God, not just have faith for the sake
of having faith. Being religious isn't a good
thing. That doesn't make us any better
off than not being religious. It's in fact A lot of times it
hardens us, as you saw, the Pharisees were so hardened against the
truth of Christ because of their religion. It prevented them from
even realizing their need and seeing that they themselves are
the sinner, that they're the ones who are guilty and in need
of salvation. And so just being religious is
not a good thing. And that's what these people
were doing because God isn't, he's not moved or impressed or
pleased with our attempt at religious works. He sees the heart. He
knows what's in our heart. He's not fooled by that external
workings and the trappings of religions that we get ourselves
caught up into. He knows what's in our heart
and he knows what we need. And so God isn't going to honor
our vain works of religion. He honors His Son. That's whom
He's pleased with. And that's why He sent you the
Gospel, to turn you to His Son, to the Lord Jesus Christ, to
show you your need of Him, that you would flee to Him. Because
all who come to the Father and the Son are received. All who
come to the Father through the Son shall find remission of sins. They shall find forgiveness and
peace forevermore with the Lord God, who is holy and righteous.
In Jeremiah 48, verse 7, Jeremiah 48, 7, it says, So the point
is, is that what we're seeing going on in Moab, we shouldn't
think, oh, that's just something that happened back then. You know, that nation of Moab
that doesn't even exist anymore, that's what they were caught
up in, in their false god. Well, that's the same thing that
happens to us today in so-called Christian churches. In our country,
and all around, people are caught up in this vain show of religion. And their Jesus, which is no
different than Chemosh, They all, they're just going into
captivity and they're believing a lie and they're trusting in
a false god and a god that cannot save because they're trusting
in their own works. They're trusting what they did
to get themselves saved by this Jesus that they talk about and
not the true and living Christ who is sovereign and almighty
and who executes the salvation, who brings the salvation to the
hearts of his people and turns them from vain dead religion
and brings them to himself. He said over in Isaiah 29, verse
13, Isaiah 29, wherefore the Lord said, for as much as this
people draw near me with their mouth and with their lips to
honor me, but I have removed their heart far from me, and
their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men. And the reality is, and you know
this, you who sit under the Gospel and who believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ, our coming to Christ is a constant coming to Christ. We have a constant need to be
reminded to hear that Gospel, and that's why we love the Gospel,
and that's why we position our lives, we set up our lives so
that we can come here and hear it as often as possible, because
we need it. We need it. It's our hope. We're
reminded again. that I am the proud and arrogant
sinner and I forget these things so quickly and I become puffed
up and vain in my imaginations but I come under the sound of
the gospel again and I'm reminded of what's important and I see
the Lord, I see that He's my inheritance, I see my need in
Him and He blesses that and that's why, and He's blessing you, that's
why He's brought you here to hear that very word so So be
thankful for the Gospel and do everything you can to be here
and to hear because that's where the Lord teaches us and He feeds
us and He warms our heart again and He breaks that hard heart
and He softens us and He brings us again to seek Him so that
we don't just become dead religious, hard sinners, just doing the
external work of religion. He keeps us humble before him. Now in verse 4, Isaiah 15, 4. Their voice shall be heard, even
unto Jahaz. Therefore the armed soldiers
of Moab shall cry out. His life shall be grievous unto
him." So Moab here is trusting, she trusted in her military strength,
in her military might, and that's nothing to take comfort in. And
you know, as much as I like our president, I don't I don't take
comfort when he says our military is the greatest military in all
the world. It might be, but that's nothing to have confidence in
because we've seen throughout all the centuries, throughout
history, how the Lord defeated great armies at the hands of
a very few people, people that should never have won and beaten
that army in that war. And the Lord, he raises kingdoms. and he brings kingdoms down.
So our comfort and our hope is not at all in the military because
the Lord can always bring that down. He can always bring that
to nothing in that day. In Zechariah 4.6 it says, Then
he answered and spake unto me, saying, This is the word of the
Lord unto Zerubbabel, saying, Not by might, nor by power, but
by my spirit, saith the Lord of hosts. So all our strength,
all our wisdom, all our might, that doesn't impress God and
it doesn't move God. It doesn't move him to say, you
know, I'm going to go with them because they're the tough guys
on the block. No, it doesn't, not at all. In
fact, if anything, it sets us up for, as the proud ones, having
a great fall and coming to nothing because God is the one who will
be glorified in the eyes of his people and he'll show us that
He doesn't need a mighty army and great strength and certain
governments to be in place just for him to have success and rule
in the hearts of his people and call his people out. In Philippians,
nothing's going to stop the gospel. None of it. We're not going to
prevent the gospel from going forth. And he can send it forth
under any government and under any circumstances. He can send
that word forth to reach his people and call them out of darkness.
In Psalm 34, verses 17 through 19, it says, Psalm 34, The righteous
cry, and the Lord heareth, and delivereth them out of all their
troubles. The Lord is nigh unto them that
are of a broken heart, and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit. Many are the afflictions of the
righteous, but the Lord delivereth him out of them all. The Lord constantly, we see him
bringing us to the end of our strength, bringing us to the
end of that which gives us confidence and strength in the flesh. It
pleases him to bring that to nothing. so that our boasting
and our glorying doesn't land on those things, but that we
see, in spite of everything I am, in spite of my sin, in spite
of my weakness, in spite of my attempts, the Lord shut those
things down, brought them to nothing, but I see his mercy
and grace in it, and that which he has done has brought me nearer
to the Lord, and I wouldn't have it any other way. And so, our
boasting and our glory is found in the Lord and not in those
things which we did and had confidence in, in the flesh. In Romans 9,
16, Paul said, So then, it is not of him that willeth. nor
of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy." He's going
to teach us that. He teaches us that over and over
in our heart. It's of the Lord that shows mercy.
It's His strength and His might and grace. All right, now dropping
down to verse 6 in our text. Isaiah 15, verses 6 and 7. We see their riches, that is
their crops, those things that they had in this world, that
they trusted in, that they had laid up, all these things were
destroyed and carried off and taken away, so that all that
they were trusting in in this world was taken away, it was
gone, it was brought to nothing. All right, Isaiah 15, six, for
the waters of Nimrim shall be desolate, for the hay is withered
away, the grass falleth, there is no green thing, therefore
the abundance they have gotten and that which they have laid
up shall they carry away to the brook of the willows. And so what that's saying, the
Brook of the Willows is really the end of Moab. It was on the
border of Moab. It's where they knew that, all
right, this is the end of Moab and then begins, I guess, Israel
or something like that. So it was a marker of a boundary. And what it's saying there is
that they were brought to the end. They came to the end, to
destruction. They came to complete desolation. And a lot of people trust in
things in the earth, right? We lay up things for our security
and we put our hope and confidence in those things. We gather up
a savings, we have a 401k account or we invest in things and we
trust in those things or we store up food or guns and ammo and
gold and silver and all that stuff and people put their trust
and their confidence in those things. But the Lord tells us
that Don't lay up your treasure here. Don't put confidence in
these things because this is where thieves break in and steal
from you and things could come in, tornadoes in this place especially,
a tornado can come ripping through, take all your belongings and
throw them out across the field somewhere and there'll be somebody
else's stuff one day even if you survive. You can't have any
confidence or trust in these things here. because the Lord
can take them away, but he doesn't need those things to preserve
us and to care for us and to show us that we are his. And remember that parable of
the rich man, it's in Luke 12. I'm not going to read it all,
but in Luke 12, 15, the Lord says unto the people that were
there, take heed and beware of covetousness, for a man's life
consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth.
And that's where his ground, he had planted and his ground
brought forth much, an abundance of fruit. He had a bumper crop,
and so he said, what am I going to do with all this? And he tears
down his small barns, builds up bigger barns. and lays it
all up there, and he was so confident in all the riches that he had
stored up, that he took his ease. He said, my heart's gonna take
my knees now, and I'm gonna enjoy that which I've laid up for myself. And the parable says that God
said unto him, thou fool this night, thy soul shall be required
of thee, then who shall those things be which thou hast provided?
So is he that layeth up his treasure for himself, and is not rich,
toward God. So the point is that we ought
not to be To set our heart and our minds
on the riches and the things that we have. These things can
be easily taken away because riches are very fleeting and
they're quick to go away. In fact, usually the more you
have, the more greedy you tend to be. The more you have, you
start getting bigger goals and then you start pushing aside
all of your generosity so you might get those little goals
that you have. But James says in 4.14, Whereas
ye know not what shall be on the morrow, for what is your
life? It is even a vapor that appeareth for a little time,
and then vanisheth away. So we see all this stripping
away and the taking away of these things and we find that man just
refuses to hear what God says. He doesn't hear him. It just
bounces off like a bulletproof glass. It doesn't affect him
or move him or cause him to seek the true and living God. And
he forgets that, and it says in Isaiah 14, 26 through 27,
that this is the purpose that is purposed upon the whole earth. And this is the hand that is
stretched out upon all the nations. for the Lord of hosts hath purposed,
and who shall disannul it? And his hand is stretched out,
and who shall turn it back?" So judgment is coming upon this
earth. The Lord is going to judge this
earth and all the wicked And we find in the text, in Isaiah
15 verse 9, that many shall be slain. It says, for the waters
of diamond shall be full of blood, for I will bring more upon diamond,
lions upon him that escapeth of Moab and upon the remnant
of the land. And what he's saying is, even
if you escape the first judgment, the next one's going to get you.
You're not going to escape. And he worded it this way in
Jeremiah 48. In Jeremiah 48 verses 43 and 44 he said, Fear and the
pit and the snare shall be upon them, O inhabitant of Moab, saith
the Lord. He that fleeth from the fear
shall fall into the pit, and he that getteth up out of the
pit shall be taken in the snare. For I will bring upon it, even
upon Moab, the year of their visitation, saith the Lord. And so this being the case with
Moab, And Moab being a picture of the sinner, which we're all
a part of, by nature, we're all in that body of sinners by nature,
in the flesh. How are we going to escape seeing
that by nature we love sin and hate the Lord and our enmity
against Him? In our natural minds, we despise
the things of God. We want to be proud in ourselves. How are we going to escape? And
Christ said it this way in Matthew 23, verses 33 through 34. He's
speaking to that religious bunch and he said, Ye servants, ye
generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?
Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets and wise men and
scribes. See, the Lord raises up wise
men. He raises up prophets to come
and preach and speak the truth and to warn the people of the
judgment which is coming upon the wicked of this earth. But the wicked in heart, they
despise it. They hate hearing the truth.
And so they treat them wrongfully. They treat those people that
speak the truth wrongfully. It says, "...and some of them
ye shall kill and crucify, and some of them ye shall scourge
in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city." Alright,
so we see though that the Lord gives the heart to his prophets
to speak the truth, to declare the truth of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And that brings us to our next point, the certainty of salvation
by Christ. the certainty of salvation by
Christ. Look at verse 5 in our text, Isaiah 15, 5. Here the
prophet says, My heart shall cry out for Moab. His fugitives
shall flee unto Zoar. now notice two things in in that
that that text there the lord you know he he's laid this burden
on the heart of isaiah and isaiah is is a jew and moab is is an
enmity is is enemies against against judah and and against
israel but he has a heart for them so that he's crying out
he's speaking the truth to moab that they would know what is
coming and it's just as The Lord sends preachers, and I'm here
tonight to preach and to declare and to speak that truth so that
you know and you understand judgment is coming upon this earth for
sin. And it's so easy for us to put it out of our minds and
to count this a small, insignificant, despised thing. We're declaring
here, I'm speaking here, I'm declaring here that God has provided
salvation in his son. He's provided a refuge for the
sinner to flee to and that we're to get to Christ because in him
is our refuge. He is the deliverer for the sinner. He comes and protects the sinners
so that no harm can come against them. And notice it says Zoar. And what I found very interesting
about it being Zoar is that he's speaking to Moab. And Moab is
the son of Lot. And Zoar is where Lot fled to
when he was fleeing the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Zoar,
which means insignificant. It's just a little town. go there. And so here we are declaring,
lifting up the Lord Jesus Christ who is insignificant and despised
in the eyes of the world. And yet he is the one to whom
we are to flee to and run to that we might be delivered. Paul
said it this way, in 1 Thessalonians 4.16 he starts, For the Lord
himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, and the voice of
the archangel, and with the trump of God. And then in 2 Thessalonians
1.8-9 he says, In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that
know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus
Christ, who shall be punished with everlasting destruction
from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power. So God has not left us without
a refuge from that coming destruction. He's provided his son, Jesus
Christ. He is the lamb slain, the one
who was provided to put away the sins of the people. I was
thinking, as you were reading, I think it was verse six, where
Abraham laid the wood on Isaac, his son, the wood for a burnt
offering. And our sin is that wood, that's
the tinder, that's the fuel of the fire, that's the fuel of
the wrath of God, which was laid upon His Son, Jesus Christ. He
made Him to be sin for us who knew no sin, that we might be
made the righteousness of God in Him. That's the reconciliation,
the ministry of reconciliation we have to declare that God has
punished His Son, and all who are in His Son, all who believe
on Him, are delivered from that punishment and that wrath to
come because Christ bore that for his people and so put it
away so that we are now made the righteousness of God to stand
before the throne of God, the holy throne of God, with that
unblameable, unblameable before the throne of God. And that's
what Isaiah tells him. In Isaiah 16, 1, he tells Moab,
this is what you do. Send ye the lamb to the ruler
of the land from Sila to the wilderness unto the mount of
the daughter of Zion. Now that harkens back to when
Moab was subject to Israel. When David was king, they were
herders of sheep and they would send the sheep to David. And that's how they continued
their relationship. And David protected them and
took care of them and treated them well while they did that. And so he's telling them, go
back to that. Be subject to my king, the Lord
Jesus Christ. You seek peace with God in the
land and the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall find peace for
your souls, and you shall be delivered from this judgment
to come." Now, they didn't. They weren't kind to the people,
because it speaks of Judah. I think it's in verses 3 and
4 where Judah would begin to be pushed out by Assyria, because
remember Assyria would come up to their neck. He wouldn't conquer
them, but he was threatening them and causing them problems
under Ahaz, and people would flee from that area and be afraid. And it came all the way to the
point of Hezekiah, before the Lord destroyed them, and He was
telling Moab, you be kind to them, and I'll be kind to you,
but they weren't, and they were ultimately destroyed because
they despised the word of what was coming. And so the prophet's
telling them though, you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, you
trust that this is God's people, and the picture there for us
is that if we hear this word, and repent, turn from our vain,
dead, false works of religion. And we are turned from that death
to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, to believe God that He
has provided His Son for this very purpose. This is why He
came into the world. Not to make us more moral and
to make our neighborhoods a nicer place to live in, but because
we're sinners who have offended holy God. That we who hear that
word and believe on Christ, and seek him for mercy and forgiveness
of sins, and to cleanse us of our sin, that we might stand
before God unblameable and holy. Those who are turned, they shall
find mercy and rest for their souls. It's like sending the
Lamb to the King of Israel. We're coming in the Lamb of the
Lord Jesus Christ to Holy God and saying, Lord, receive me.
Have mercy upon me. Forgive me of my sins as have
been put away in your Son, Jesus Christ. And Christ said in John
6.37, All that the Father giveth me shall come to me, and him
that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. So you who are
outcasts of this world, you who are wanderers, you who are sinners,
you who are bankrupt and poor and needy and have nothing to
give to God, he says, come to me, come to me and I will take
care of you. I will lift up all your burdens
so that you have no fear to die. You have no fear of God, you
have no fear of the coming judgment and wrath upon God. Though this
world will hate you, but in me you shall find peace and rest
for your souls and you shall have sons and daughters and mothers
in abundance in the kingdom of God in this life and in the life
to come for all who trust in the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
So He provides that in His Son who delivers His people from
spiritual darkness. He takes that darkness away.
He takes the veil of darkness off our hearts that we might
know the sin and the vanity of man, the sin and the vanity of
ourselves and our folly, and that we would fall before the
Son of God and seek Him for mercy and grace and kindness. So the
Lord You who would have life and see
many good days, seek the Lord. Come in the land to the Holy
God and He shall receive you. And I'm going to end it there,
but it's the Lord Jesus Christ who gives us life, and he's the
one who saves us from that coming destruction on this world. He's
the light giver and the life giver. He's the way and the truth. And so come to him and know the
true and living God. Be delivered from the darkness
that we are by nature. I pray the Lord will bless that.
to your hearts and that you'll flee to the Lord Jesus Christ
for forgiveness of sins. Let's pray. Our gracious Lord,
we thank you, Father, for your mercy, your grace in sending
your Son. Lord, we know that we are sinners,
that by nature we are the rebels. We have tried to cast off God
and the rule and the dominion of God who created us. We did
it in Adam. We do it in our own sin every
day, proving that we are bankrupt sinners in darkness, in spiritual
darkness, having no light. But Lord, we thank you for this
Gospel. We thank you that you have declared the way of salvation
in your Son, Jesus Christ. Lord, we ask that you would break
our hearts. Lord, if we are being stubborn
and refusing to hear, Lord, cause us to hear Christ, to hear his
voice, to see our need of him and to come to Christ, believing
on him and to come in the land, the land whom you've provided,
your son, Jesus Christ. It's in his name we pray and
give thanks. Amen.