Good evening. All right, we're
going to begin Isaiah chapter 1. Begin Isaiah. So we'll pick up in verse 1. Our text will be the first nine
verses, but I'm going to read verse 1 here. Isaiah 1. the vision of Isaiah,
the son of Amos, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem
in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of
Judah. So Isaiah's ministry spanned
the reign of four different kings. He covered Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz,
and Hezekiah. And it's believed that he lived
to be about 120 years old, Isaiah. 120 years old and if that's the case
then he is believed to have ministered for 85 years focusing his ministry
there to the inhabitants of Judah and Jerusalem and he's quoted
more than any other prophet or any other Old Testament book
by the writers of the New Testament with the exception of the Psalms
and he seems he writes with such clarity and They say his writing
is so beautiful because he was very well educated, but he writes
with such clarity that it seems like as if he was writing something
historical because it's such an eyewitness account. It's so
beautiful the way that he writes everything, especially with the
clarity that he had on the coming Messiah. And yet he wrote this
about 770 years before Christ ever even came, before he was
born. Before we get to the message,
I just also want to say a few other things that Isaiah was
the one that the Lord used to prophesy John the Baptist's coming. He prophesied very much concerning
our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The Lord's first message that
he preached was from Isaiah 61. The first message that he preached
there in Nazareth was from Isaiah 61. And it was also where the
eunuch was reading in Isaiah 53, when Philip was led of the
spirit alongside his chariot. And from there, from Isaiah,
Philip preached Christ to the eunuch there. So Isaiah is believed
or thought, he's very evangelical and very, some would even call
him an apostle, if you will, that his book was like one of
the gospels when we read it. The title is Isaiah's State of
the Union Address. And it's because the way Isaiah
addresses the people there, it seems like he's recounting to
them exactly the state of how things are there in Israel. And he gives them such an address. It's so just plain and laid out
there for them that I would imagine it was very offensive to their
flesh because they were a very religious people. The Lord said that if it wasn't
for there being a small remnant there, a people that he himself
set his love upon, he would destroy them the way he destroyed Sodom
and Gomorrah. What I want us to at least realize
is that when Isaiah is speaking to the Jews there in his day,
it's very relevant to us. It's a lasting message that is
very true of the church, the outward church today, as it was
back there in Israel. And so as we're going through
it, just consider and think, Lord, is this a description of
me? Is this something I need to hear,
something I need to consider and think about? Do I love the
Lord Jesus Christ? Is my hope set upon this world
and the riches and the glory of this world? Or is my hope
set on something that I'm doing in religion, some works that
I'm doing to feel good about my standing before you in that
great and final day? Or is all my hope on the Lord
Jesus Christ? If it's anything but the Lord
Jesus Christ, then you are yet in your sins. It must be all
in Christ. It can't be Christ plus something
else. It's all of Christ or it's not Christ at all. We'll look
at three divisions. First, we'll consider a familiar
word. Third, the harsh reality of sin. And then we're gonna look at
saved by grace. So under that first heading,
a familiar word. In Isaiah verse two, chapter
one, verse two, He uses words that would likely have been very
familiar, very meaningful to the people, the religious people,
especially because when they would go to the synagogue or
the temple, they would listen and hear some portion of the
book of Moses being read. And he says there in the first
half of verse two, Hear, O heavens, and give ear. O'erth for the
Lord hath spoken. Now turn over to Deuteronomy,
save your place there. and Isaiah 1, but turn over to
Deuteronomy 32. Deuteronomy 32, and let's look
at verse 1. Here we read very familiar words.
Deuteronomy 32, verse 1. Give ear, O ye heavens, and I
will speak, and hear o'er the words of my mouth. Now these
are words that are spoken by Moses. Moses, and we know the
importance that Moses held among the Jews there, for by Moses
they had the law. They had the law given to them,
right? Which they read regularly. So these words would have sounded
familiar to them if they were going to the temple regularly.
But besides these words being so similar, look at what Moses
was saying to the people there. Look at Deuteronomy 31. Deuteronomy
31. and I think you'll see a similarity.
He says, take this book of the law, oh, sorry, Deuteronomy 31,
verse 26. Verse 26. He says, take this
book of the law and put it in the side of the ark of the covenant
of the Lord your God, that it may be there for a witness against
thee, for a witness against thee. For I know thy rebellion and
thy stiff neck. Behold, while I am yet alive
with you this day, ye have been rebellious against the Lord,
and how much more after my death. And then he says to them, go
ahead, gather the elders together, I've got some things to say to
all the elders. And he goes on in verse 29, he
says, For I know that after my death ye will utterly corrupt
yourselves and turn aside from the way which I have commanded
you, and evil will befall you in the latter days, because ye
will do evil in the sight of the Lord, to provoke him to anger
through the work of your hands. And that's exactly what Israel
did. When Moses died, they went on and they began to do various
works with their hands and provoke the Lord to anger. And so Isaiah
uses these familiar words to them of what Moses had said,
knowing that, you know, you heard Moses in his day. Well, now I'm
speaking to you the words of the Lord. Hear them. If you gave
heed to what Moses said, then hear what the Lord says this
day. You know, he's saying to them,
basically, we're in those latter times that Moses spoke of. This
is time now. That testimony which Moses had
you put in the Ark of the Covenant for a witness against you, here
I am to bear witness against you of what you're doing, he's
saying to them. So just as Israel heard them,
they need to hear these words, because these are the words of
the Lord. And he goes on to say in the second half of verse two,
I have nursed and brought up children, and they have rebelled
against me. Now, National Israel pictures
the chosen people of God, right? They had the oracles of God,
they had the law, they had prophets sent to them. There was about
at least four prophets sent to them before Isaiah was raised
up of the Lord. And they were to seek the God
of their fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob. And they were to seek him by
faith, by faith. But when they sought the Lord
and looked at the law, they sought the Lord by the works of their
hands. And that's why they were provoking
the Lord to anger. The Apostle Paul noted concerning
this people, he said in Romans 9, verses 4 and 5, speaking of
the Israelites, he says, to whom pertaineth the adoption and the
glory and the covenants and the giving of the law and the service
of God and the promises, whose are the fathers and of whom as
concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all God blessed forever.
Amen. But Isaiah declares this truth
that in the midst of all their religion and everything that
they had they were resting and trusting in those things so that
they became idolaters in their religion. Their religion of the
true living God they became idolaters because they looked to those
carnal man-made things and they looked to the works of their
own hands thinking that they were pleasing God and doing God's
service by their works and all they were doing was provoking
the Lord to anger. And if we want to get an idea
of some of what they were doing, turn over to 2 Kings. 2 Kings,
verse 16. And you can see this is what
was going on at the time of these kings here. 2 Kings 16, and we'll
pick up in verse 1. And it says, in the 17th year
of Pekah, the son of Remaliah, and I believe he's the king over
Assyria at that time, It says, Ahaz, the son of Jotham, king
of Judah, began to reign. Now, Ahaz being the son of Jotham,
those were two of the four kings that were mentioned there during
Isaiah's time of ministry. Verse two, 20 years old was Ahaz
when he began to reign, and reigned 16 years in Jerusalem, and did
not that which was right in the sight of the Lord his God, like
David his father. Now, this is what they were doing,
verse three. But he walked in the way of the kings of Israel,
yea, and made his son to pass through the fire, according to
the abominations of the heathen, whom the Lord cast out from before
the children of Israel. And he sacrificed and burnt incense
in the high places and on the hills and under every green tree." This was typical of just what
Israel was doing. They were practicing a little
bit, serving the Lord, and practicing a bit, serving Baal and Molech
and all these other things. So they were just blending in
all these different ideas and philosophies and religions of
all the people that were around them. And the Lord would purge
them eventually of this. As we know, they would go into
exile. Israel would go into exile in Assyria. And Judah would go
into exile under Babylon. and they were purged eventually
of that worship of Baal and those other outward false gods, but
they never were delivered of that false, dead-letter religion. As we know, when the Lord came,
they continued to just practice a dead-letter, outward religion,
not by faith. They were still trusting in the
works of their own hands, so that when Christ came, they rejected
him. They rejected him. As John 1
11 says, he came unto his own, and his own received him not. So they were still practicing.
They never left that idolatry. They continued to practice that
vain form of religion and stumbled over the stumbling stone, which
is Christ. And this is relevant to the outward Christian church
of our day, right? They say that there's so many
millions of Christians in the world, but are they Christians? Do they really love the Lord
Jesus Christ and following him? There's many that call themselves
Christians, but they're not worshiping the Christ that's revealed in
the scriptures, and they're not trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ
that's revealed according to the scriptures, that it's Christ,
that it's God through Christ that saves his people. Instead, they're worshiping a
false, helpless Jesus, right, who's dependent upon the people
to make a saving decision for themselves, that Christ has done
all that he can do, and now he's waiting for the sinner to make
a decision for Jesus, to accept Jesus into his heart, and to
let him. Just on the way over here, I was looking at a sign,
and they had that word, let, let God. And that was the worst
part about the sign. There were some other gross things
on it, but it was just a silly saying, but it was let God, let
God. The Synod doesn't let God do
anything. That's not a God to bow down
and worship before. We worship the God of the Scriptures,
which declares that he does whatsoever he pleases, and what he does
is right and good and holy and just. And we're the corrupters.
We're the corrupted ones. We're the ones who don't know
the true and living God. So these are those that, like
Moses said, would provoke the Lord to anger through the works
of their own hands. Right? They're building and making
religions and they're taking the Lord's name in vain and they're
trusting in those things all under the works of their own
hands. And that's the majority of what Christianity is today,
the works of their own hands, what they're doing to save themselves.
They usually know a good bit of the right lingo to say, but
they're still trusting in and they're still looking to what
they do or don't do to have confidence that in that day they'll be able
to stand before God. And I know what it is because
I did it for so many years. And in spite of all my works,
I never had confidence. I was always afraid that I didn't
do enough. That when I got there, I was
going to find out, nope, I just missed it by a hair. Because
I was looking to my own works. Even though I knew it was all
of Christ, but I didn't know it was all of Christ. I still
looked to and trusted in my own work. So that's why it's such
an egregious, awful religion, because it even takes the truth
of God, uses the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,
and it convinces them that if you just do these things, you
can have that peace with God. But they're always working, they're
always looking to the works of their hands, and they're never
at peace, right? But Paul says in Romans 9, 6,
it's not as though the word of God hath taken none effect, for
they are not all Israel, which are of Israel. Now Isaiah speaking
the word of the Lord, he says to the people in verses 2 and
3, Isaiah 1, 2 and 3, I have nourished and brought up children
and they have rebelled against me. The ox knoweth his owner
and the ass his master's crib, but Israel doth not know, my
people doth not consider. Now who are these people? If
you saw your place in Deuteronomy, go back to Deuteronomy 32. Who
are these people? Are they the children Are they
really true children found in Israel here that he's speaking
of, these children of Israel? In Deuteronomy 32, verse 5, Moses
goes on, and this is what Moses says, Deuteronomy 32, 5. They have corrupted themselves.
Their spot, their defect, their blemish, their flaw, their injury,
their shame, their defilement, their spot is not the spot of
his children. They are a perverse and a crooked
generation. They've done works to make themselves
holy and righteous before God in their mind. Their spot's not
the same as God's people. They're not so hurt and so broken
that they can't correct and get this thing set right and make
everything right. And they're okay now with the
Lord because They've done the works of the law to make themselves
righteous. Their spot is not the spot of
God's children, because God's children know there's nothing
that we can do to make ourselves righteous. There's nothing that
we can do to cleanse us of our sins. There's nothing we can
do to make ourselves acceptable to God, or that God should look
upon us and say, you know what? I'm going to have mercy on this
one. This one's trying really hard, and they're good in their
hearts, so I'm going to have mercy on this one. No, that's
not how the Lord speaks. He's holy. God is holy. He's perfect and just and righteous
in all his ways. He is perfection. And when man
begins to think himself to be something, when he's not, he
begins to elevate himself and to bring down the holiness of
God so he can get it to where he can meet the holiness that
God requires. Because he knows that to stand
before God, you must be as holy as God. So he's got to find ways
to knock down the holiness of God and to show that he's doing
his best so that he can have some of that honor. But turn
over to the New Testament and we'll see this word used as well.
Go over to Jude, Jude 12, Jude verse 12, it's only one chapter,
right there before Revelation. Jude verse 12 and verse 13. the apostles were speaking of
these spots, these wicked ones that came in parading themselves
to be true Christians, true children of God, so that they could win
some of the people over, that could begin to fund them and
provide for them, so that they could charge money and teach
them things that they should know according to philosophies
and all other kinds of ideas. And he says in verse 12, these
are spots in your feasts of charity These are spots in your feasts
of charity. They were posing as Christians, they were wolves
in sheep's clothing, but they were really, they were just liars.
They were just, they were just appearing as angels of light
before the people, but they didn't have the spirit of Christ, and
they didn't have a love for the Lord Jesus Christ. And Jude says,
when they feast with you, feeding themselves without fear, clouds
they are without water, carried about by winds, about of winds,
trees whose fruit withereth, without fruit, twice dead, plucked
up by the roots. Our Lord said, you'll know them
by their fruit. And don't be afraid. Like when
you look at them, you say, well, how am I going to know by their
fruit? They seem to be doing good works just like everybody
else. I'm trying to do good works and they're doing good works.
How do I know them by their fruit? Who are they given glory to?
Who do they trust in? Are they given all the glory
to Christ? Are they humble? And they're
saying, it's not me, don't look at me. Anything you see in me,
it's of the Lord. Or are they giving the glory
to themselves and saying, I've been convicted and I've put my
stake in the ground and I'm resolved now that I'm going to be doing
this and that and the other thing for the Lord and I'm not going
to be going with that over there anymore. I'm doing this work
for the Lord now. When they're talking like that,
that's how you know that their fruit is dead. It's corrupt,
it's of the flesh, it's not of the Spirit, because the Spirit
doesn't talk about us. It's not boasting of anyone but
the Lord Jesus Christ. So when a person speaks by, if
you want to know them by their fruit, just listen to who they're
giving glory to. Just listen to who is getting
all the glory. Raging waves, he says, of the
sea, in verse 13, foaming out their own shame, wandering stars,
to whom is reserved the blackness and darkness forever. All right,
flip over to 2 Peter, 2 Peter 2. He's also speaking of these
spots as well. 2 Peter 2, verse 13. In the middle of the verse, 2
Peter 2, 13, he says, spots, they are in blemishes, sporting
themselves with their own deceivings while they feast with you, having
eyes full of adultery that cannot cease from sin. Beguiling unstable
souls, in heart they have exercised with covetous practices, cursed
children, which have forsaken the right way and are gone astray,
following the way of Balaam, the son of Bozor, who loved the
wages of unrighteousness. Drop down to verse 18. For when
they speak great swelling words of vanity, they allure through
the lusts of the flesh, through much wantonness, those that were
clean escaped from them who live in error. While they promise
them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption.
for of whom a man is overcome of the same as he brought in
bondage. And that's where all, I mean,
we know what sin is and we know that sin is wrong and it's evil
and we're not to be practicing it, but it all finds its root
and it all stems from and starts from that preaching of the law
for righteousness. It all begins here in the pulpit
where men are telling you that by your goodness and by your
good works, you can make yourself holy and righteous and sanctified
with God. It all begins there. And then
that carnal man begins to buck up against it and fight against
it and war against it because he knows in his flesh that's
not what he wants to do. He doesn't want to do that. He
wants to go off and do things that the flesh lusts for and
what the flesh wants to do. And then there are some that
have so made themselves so holy and righteous and they have a
good standing by it so they continue in their way, but they're not
trusting in the Lord either. So it all begins there from that
idea and that concept that we, apart from Christ, can make ourselves
something before holy God. So, and they get overwhelmed
about it. So, I mean, overcome by their
sin and iniquity that dwells in their heart. And no doubt
that we're in the latter times, right? It started in the Lord's
day, continues to our day. And so we're to watch and to
be prayerful and to be looking, as the Lord said, to be trusting
in Him, looking to Him because this world is just swirling with
every wind of doctrine, right? All kinds of things, from the
most legal of legalists all the way to the most loose and liberal
ones that you can have. It's just swirling with a whole
host of winds and everything that's going on. So watch, brethren. And don't set your heart on the
things of this world. Don't set your heart on the riches
of this world, and the fame of this world, and the games of
this world, and the glory of this world. Don't set your heart
on these things as though this is what we're here on this life
for. And so many young people, they
just, you know, education's good. It's not bad to get an education,
but So many get these educations and then they go off and their
hearts get set on the riches of this world as though that's
their security and their hope and their peace and their joy
is these things. Don't look to this world for
your happiness, brethren. Paul said to Timothy, for the
love of money is the root of all evil, which while some coveted
after, they have erred from the faith and pierced themselves
through with many sorrows. And then, on the other side,
don't be deceived by false religion, right? Who, like Balaam, they
teach a sensual and fleshly religion. And that's going anywhere from
telling people, it doesn't matter what you do now, you can go off
and just sin, because that's what Christ died for, to pay
for that sin. He shed his blood and said, you
can just go out and do what you want, And don't worry about it.
Don't feel guilty about it. Christ wouldn't want you to feel
guilty about it. He put that away. And it's from there and
it's all the way up to the most legal one who's just trusting
in how well he's keeping those Ten Commandments and how well
he's whipping and telling other people to keep those Ten Commandments
and keeping himself and keeping his family and keeping other
brethren in line so that he can boast in what they're doing.
Either one is a sensual, carnal religion. They're still trusting
in the works of their own hands, the works of the flesh. And that's
what Moses said, evil will befall you in the latter days because
ye will do evil in the sight of the Lord to provoke him to
anger through the works of your hands. And what was the ultimate
work that man did? What was the ultimate work that
man with his own hands did in religion? It's in Acts 2.23,
Christ being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge
of God, ye have taken and by wicked hands have crucified and
slain, whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death,
because it was not possible that he should be holding of it. So
there's man in all his religion and all that he hopes in, in
his carnal works of his hands, he took the Lord of glory and
he crucified him. That's what man does in his best
religion. And, you know, you might ask,
and sometimes I wonder, you know, will they kill Christians again? You know, let me read this one,
John 16, one through three. These things, our Lord said,
have I spoken unto you that ye should not be offended. They
shall put you out of the synagogues. Yea, the time cometh that whosoever
killeth you will think that he doeth God's service. These things
will they do unto you because they have not known the Father
nor me." And I read that verse and I was thinking, you know,
I wonder, you know, will they kill Christians again in America
someday? And I don't know. I don't really
know if they will. I tend to think that there will
come a day where that would be acceptable and could happen. But right now, you consider that
people are in such a heavy, heavy sleep. We're in such a mist and
a slumber and we're just so content in our darkness and our slumber
and just all the nonsense that's going on. The deception is so
strong that you wonder why would anybody want to disturb that?
Just keep it like it is. Nobody's not doing anything anyway,
so just keep it like it is. But our Lord said in Luke 9 verse
23, and we should remember this, what our Lord said, To them all,
he said this, if any man will come after me, let him deny himself
and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whosoever will
save his life shall lose it, but whosoever will lose his life
for my sake, the same shall save it. For what is a man advantaged
if he gain the whole world and lose himself or be cast away? For whosoever shall be ashamed
of me and of my words, of him shall the son of man be ashamed
when he shall come in his own glory, and in his father's, and
of the holy angels." So whether or not men or women kill Christians
again someday, we've all, we who profess Christ, all have
a death to die anyway. Our flesh has been crucified
with the Lord Jesus Christ. So it's already been slain. It's
already been put to death. And we are to put that, just
let it die. Don't feed the flesh pursuing
the world, don't feed the flesh, pursuing your false, vain, dead
religion, it's crucified. Like Paul said, I am crucified
with Christ. Nevertheless I live, yet not
I, but Christ liveth in me, and the life which I now live, I
live, which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith, the
faithfulness of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself
for me. So we live not by our faith in
Christ, we live by the faithfulness of the Lord Jesus Christ. And
God gives his people that faith, that hope in the Lord Jesus Christ.
So it's not by our faith that we hope in these things. It's
not our faith that saves us, but the faithfulness of the Lord
Jesus Christ. So the prophet here is addressing
Israel, right? And he's giving them familiar
words and saying, hear what the Lord is saying. Hear what the
Lord is saying. Hear, O heavens, and give ear,
O earth, for the Lord hath spoken. Alright, now in verse 4 Isaiah
says, They've gone away backward, and
the margin says they've alienated or separated. Well, who's doing
the alienation and the separating and the provoking and the forsaking?
It's the people. The people are forsaking the
Lord. They're the ones turning away
from the Lord. They're the ones separating themselves from the
Lord, and that's what carnal man does, right? Back there in
the garden, what happened? Adam and Eve ran off into the
garden. They ran away from the Lord when they heard Him coming.
They are the ones who sewed on fig leaves to cover their own
nakedness. It's always man. Man is always
running away from the Lord, and he wants nothing to do with the
Lord. And that's why, as our Lord said,
you will not come to me that you might have life, because
it's not in the heart of man. He forsakes the Lord, he wants
nothing to do with the Lord, and he will not be saved. So unless the Lord does the work
for a man, for a sinner, a man or a woman, That sinner shall
not come. They will not come. It's not
their will to come. They don't want to come to the
Lord. So the Lord must do it. And it's
a shame because we think we're so wise and we're so confident
in the things that we do and we're so sure of ourselves. You
listen to just what people say. on the TV or on the radio or
whatever and they're just so sure of their teaching and their
education and what they believe about God or that God doesn't
exist and they are confident in it. And yet, they change their
theories and their thoughts on things all the time. And you
wonder, why are you so confident in man's logic? He's always explaining
how there's so much we don't know and so much we don't understand
and they're changing their ideas and their concepts and their
theories often, all the time, and yet they're so sure that
they're right and that there's no God. They betray their own
logic so often, and they have so many vain thoughts that they
can't even tell the difference between one lie and another lie,
and they just go on swallowing the bait. Jonah says in Jonah
2.8, they that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy. They forsake their own mercy. And he said, and Isaiah says,
Ah, sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a seed of evildoers,
children that are corruptors, they have forsaken the Lord. Now turn over to Luke 14. Let's
go to Luke 14. Luke 14, verse 25. We read that while our Lord was
ministering there in Israel and healing many people and doing
good works for the people. We see here at verse 25, and
there went great multitudes with Jesus. And he turned and he said
unto them, if any man will come to me and hate not his father
and mother and wife and children and brethren and sisters, yea,
in his own life also, he cannot be my disciple. But whosoever
doth not bear his cross, and come after me, he cannot be my
disciple. For which of you, intending to
build a tower, sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost,
whether he hath sufficient to finish it? Lest, happily, after
he hath laid the foundation, and is not able to finish it,
all that behold it begin to mock him, saying, This man began to
build, and was not able to finish. Let me just pause there, and
just assure you, brethren, whose hope is the Lord Jesus Christ,
you have sufficient to finish that tower. You have sufficient
because Christ is all and all the riches that he has are yours
because he accomplished salvation for his people. When you hear
that and you think in yourself, I don't have the sufficiency.
You're right, I don't have the sufficiency. None of us have
what it takes to finish that tower. Only Christ can do, can
finish the work. Then he says in verse 31, Or
what king, going to make war against another king, sitteth
not down first, and consulteth whether he be able with ten thousand
to meet him that cometh against him with twenty thousand? Or
else, while the other is yet a great way off, he sendeth an
embassage, and desireth conditions of peace. So likewise, whosoever
he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be
my disciple. Salt is good, but if the salt
have lost its savor, wherewith shall it be salted or seasoned?
It is neither fit for the land, nor yet for the dunghill, but
men cast it out. He that hath ears to hear, let
him hear." And like Paul said, who is sufficient for these things?
None of us is sufficient for that. None of us is, that seasoning,
none of us is able to even negotiate with the king. And none of us
are able to make war against him for he is the Lord of glory
and we can't defeat him. This flesh thinks and wants to
have its way and believes, honestly believes that somehow things
are going to work out, but it doesn't. Isaiah goes on to say
in verse 5, why should ye be stricken any more? Ye will revolt
more and more. So the Lord was striking the
people. He was striking the people so that they would know that
they were rebelling against him. But as we know with wicked man,
You can beat a man, you can whip him, you could bind him with
all kinds of chains and laws and rules and regulations, and
he's going to hate it. He's still going to fight it
in his heart. He's just going to despise the things that you're
saying to him. It doesn't matter how many times
you strike or beat on your body, it's always going to do and lust
for the things that the flesh lusts for. because the flesh
doesn't lust for the things of God. The flesh lusts for the
things of the earth. It's looking for carnal, fleshly
things, whether they be sinful, lustful things or be sinful,
religious things. The flesh lusts for carnal things
and tries to and only understands the carnal, fleshly So, you can
beat a person, I think there's a hymn, it's a Joseph Hart hymn
that says, Law and terrors do but harden, all the while they
work alone, but a sense of blood-bought pardon soon dissolves a heart
of stone. So, the Lord, it's by grace that
we're saved, it's not by the binding and the beating of the
law upon us. They had that, they had the religion,
all this stuff, and it says, you know, with the works of their
hands, he said, the whole head is sick and the whole heart faint,
that is, your thoughts and your philosophies are all ruined,
your religion, your hope, it's all, the heart is faint, it's
all, it's all, it does you no good. And he says, from the sole
of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness in it but
wounds and bruises and putrefying sores. And that's a perfect description
of every son and daughter of Adam. That's what we are by nature,
just full of wounds and bruises and putrefying sores. And with
all our religion and everything that we've tried to do, we can't
even correct it or heal it or make it right. Paul said, ye
were dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh. So with all the religion and
all the works of our hands, it did them no profit. Isaiah went
on to say, concerning your wounds and bruises and putrefying sores,
he says, they've not been closed, neither bound up, neither mollified
with ointment. All the things that you tried
to do, you didn't heal your wound, you didn't make it better, you
didn't make it right, you've done nothing to improve the situation. Your country, he says in verse
7, is desolate. Your cities are burned with fire.
Your land, strangers devour it in your presence and it's desolate
as overthrown by strangers. So all their false religion did
was just stir up a love for the flesh and a love for these things
and they continued in these things and pursued them even harder
and more fervently after other gods thinking that that would
make things better. And it was the very thing that
just kept them in their death and in their false religion and
their false hope, and it just kept them separated from the
Lord. And he says that you're basically
under siege. You're basically wrapped up as
a house in a garden of cucumbers. He says in verse eight, and the
daughter of Zion is left as a cottage in a vineyard, as a lodge in
a garden of cucumbers, as a besieged city. You know the way that cucumbers
will reach up and they'll grab up and they'll pull themselves
up and then they'll stick their tentacles out a little further
and pull themselves up and then they wrap all around and I mean
I've had cucumbers growing inside fences you know and just weaves
its way through it's pretty amazing and he's saying that all your
religion has just wrapped you up like a garden of cucumbers
and you're bound and you can't get out of it because no man
can get out by the works of his own hands and his own religion. So, are you going after religion? Are you here just for religion?
Are you here, you know, do you love the world? Are you pursuing
the things that the flesh lusts after? Or do you hear the word
of your God and you say, Lord, I need your salvation. I need
the hope that you've provided. Isaiah said this in 55 verse
7, let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his
thoughts and let him return unto the Lord and he will have mercy
upon him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon." All
right, let's just look at that third point now, saved by grace. He says in verse nine, except
the Lord of hosts had left unto us a very small remnant, we should
have been as Sodom, and we should have been like unto Gomorrah. Now, those children whose father
is the devil, they hear this and they say, well, there's nothing
for me. You know, a lot of times they'll be thinking, I wish so
and so was here to hear that. You know, I hope so-and-so is
listening to this thing, but they themselves usually feel
like they've got it all together and there's nothing for them
to worry about. And they say, I'm confident in
my refuge of lies. And I've known people like that
that said, don't worry about me. I'm, I'm all good. Don't
worry about me. Everything will work out for
me in that day. And then I find out, you know,
that they've passed away and it's a very sad thing because
Is it working out for them now? They're standing before the Lord
of Glory and they wanted to hear nothing of His salvation and
what He accomplished on the cross for His people. It's all, we
need to hear the gospel all the time because we know in our flesh
we go back to setting our hearts either on this world or our hearts
go right back to that Arminian thought of I gotta be doing more
to make sure that everything's gonna be good for me in that
great and final day, but it's interesting that the child of
God usually does tremble and they hear, you know, they look
at what Israel did and they say, Lord, may that never be so with
me. Don't let me fall away like that.
Don't let me get blinded by religion and fall away thinking that my
religion is my righteousness or just to become indifferent
to it and just grow cold and tired of of all the stuff, may
that never be. So they usually are the ones
that hear it and are made to cry out like that publican and
beat upon their chest and say, Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner. Right? But you who are sinners,
fear not. God is merciful to all who come
to him, begging him for grace and mercy. He's a tender God.
If you're as a king going to make war against another king,
You can't defeat this one. This is the Lord of Glory, and
He is coming again just as He promised. And we shall not be
able to come against Him, but He's a merciful and a gracious
and a gentle Savior. And He receives all those who
come to Him, crying out to Him for mercy, desire and peace,
knowing that it's all Him, all His way, and they bow before
Him and submit to Him willingly. and say, Lord, I need your salvation
because I can't do it myself. Turn over to Ephesians 2. Ephesians
2. And in verse 11 it says, Wherefore
remember that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh who
are called uncircumcision by that which is called the circumcision
in the flesh made by hands, right? Those Jews that provoke the Lord
to anger by the works of their hands that at that time ye were
without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel
and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and
without God in the world. But now, in Christ Jesus, ye
who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ."
What did Christ accomplish there on the cross where his blood
was shed? Paul says in Romans 9.27, Isaiah
also cried concerning Israel, though the number of the children
of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved. For he will finish the work and
cut it short in righteousness, because a short work will the
Lord make upon the earth. So man's on the earth doing all
he can do with his works of righteousness, and yet the Lord comes and says,
I'm going to do just a short work. I'm going to give the work
to my son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and he's going to perfect righteousness
once and for all for His people there on the cross. He's going
to bear their shame, their sin, their guilt. And God poured out
His wrath upon the Savior so that He is our perfect substitute. For all who come to Him, hoping
in Him, believing on Him by faith, the faith which God gives, His
salvation, His sacrifice is sufficient and perfect to save to the uttermost. There's nothing you or I can
do to save ourselves. but Christ did it all for his
people. He's a perfect salvation. And Isaiah said before, except
the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed. We had been as Sodom
and been made like unto Gomorrah. And what shall we say then that
the Gentiles, which followed not after righteousness, have
attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which is of
faith? But Israel, which followed after the law of the law of righteousness,
had not attained to the law of righteousness, The natural man,
they hear and they think, I got to straighten up. There's something
I got to start doing or something I got to stop doing or try harder
and harder to do it. And when you read that chapter
in one and you look at the scathing, not scathing, but just the plain
declaration of what Israel had become. And in the flesh it's
so easy to just look at that and say, wow, there are sinners
and I'm such a sinner, I really need to heed the word and get
myself straight. It's not that. The Gentiles attained
righteousness by faith. by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
You're not ever going to make yourself righteous enough. You're
never going to get yourself clean enough for God to accept you.
I'm never going to get myself clean enough. You're never going
to get yourself clean enough. We're sinners, desperately in
need of the grace of God. And He provided it in His Son,
Jesus Christ. And all who hear that message
and come to Him by faith, believing what God has said, that this
is how I save. I save my people in my Son, Jesus
Christ. He put away their sin perfectly. You hear that message and you
believe? Give God the glory because that faith is a gift of God. And not all men have faith. Not
all have faith. God only gives it to his child,
and they hope in Christ to the end. He saves his people. He
does all the work. As he said of the Jews, the reason
why they were provoked in the Lord by the works of their hands,
and the reason why is because they sought it not by faith,
but as it were by the works of the law, for they stumbled at
that stumbling stone, right? Through the works of their own
hands, they stumbled at that stumbling stone, which is Christ,
as it's written, behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone, a
rock of offense, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed."
So, as we go through Isaiah, just keep listening and seeing
how the Lord saves His people by grace and faith. You'll hear
You'll hear things of how Israel was very wicked and full of sin
and darkness and iniquity, and that's true of us. Our flesh
is full of wickedness and sin and iniquity and darkness. Our righteousness isn't going
to come by straightening up and getting ourselves right. It comes
by the Lord Jesus Christ. He's accomplished our justification
and our sanctification and everything necessary for us to stand before
God on that day. I pray the Lord will bless that
word to our hearts. I'll close this in prayer now
and then Joe, if you can just lead us in the final. Our gracious
Lord, we thank you, Lord, for your mercy. Father, help us because
we know what sinners we are, Lord, and we have you to thank
for that. And we see that there's nothing
we can do by our works to make ourselves righteous with God.
The Lord deliver us from that thought of the flesh, that Arminian
flesh that thinks there's something we can do, that there's something
we must do, but Lord help us to rest in the Lord Jesus Christ. Your word says you have a remnant,
a people that you love, that you've called out. Lord, call
this people by your son. In faith, Lord, give us faith
to look to Christ and to him alone. We pray this in Jesus'
name, our Lord and Savior. Amen. Our closing hem is going to be
from your soft back binder number 13, deeper than the stain has
gone. 13. And we're going to sing that
this time to what a friend we have in Jesus. And we're not
going to sing the refrain. So what's in bold there we're
going to skip. Learn to stain that soiled man's
nature On the distance that he fell Far removed from hope and
hell Into deep despair and hell Because the fountain opened,
and the blood of God's own Son Purifies the soul and reaches
deeper than the stain has come. Conscious of the deep pollution,
sinners wander in the night. Though they hear the shepherd
calling, they still fear to face the light. This the blessed consolation
That can melt the heart of stone, That sweep all the Gilead beaches,
Deeper than the stain has gone. O unworthy we who wander, That
our eyes are wet with tears, As we think of love that sought
us through the weary wasted years. Yea, we've walked a holy highway,
walking by God's grace alone. Knowing Calvary's fountain reaches
Deeper than the stain has gone. And with holy choirs we're standing
In the presence of the King. And our souls are lost in wonder
While the white rope choirs sing Then we'll praise the name of
Jesus With the millions round the throne Praise Him for the
power that reaches deeper than the state has known.