Thus saith the Lord, Keep your
judgments, and do justice. For my salvation is near to come,
and my righteousness to be revealed. Blessed is the man that doeth
this, and the son of man that layeth hold on it, that keepeth
the Sabbath from polluting it, and keepeth his hand from doing
evil. Neither let the son of the stranger
that hath joined himself to the Lord speak, saying, The Lord
hath utterly separated me from his people. Neither let the eunuch
say, Behold, I am a dry tree. For thus saith the Lord to the
eunuchs that keep my Sabbaths, and choose the things that please
me, and take hold of my covenant. Even unto them will I give in
mine house and within my walls a place and a name better than
the sons and daughters. I will give them an everlasting
name that shall not be cut off. Also the sons of the stranger
that join themselves to the Lord to serve Him, to love the name
of the Lord, to be His servants, everyone that keepeth the Sabbath
from polluting it, and taketh hold of my covenant. Even to
them will I bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful
in the house of prayer. Their burnt offerings and their
sacrifices will be accepted upon mine altar. For mine house shall
be called a house of prayer for all people. For the Lord will
gather the outcasts of Israel, saith, Yet will I gather others
to Him, besides those that are gathered unto Him." Now I want
to divide this for you. I want you to see the division
in this chapter. The first two verses, God deals
with His salvation. His salvation. He says this,
He said, Thus saith the Lord, Keep judgment, do justice, for
My salvation is near to come. And he tells us who the blessed
man is. The blessed man, the happy man,
is he that doth this and layeth hold on it, keeping his Sabbath,
not polluting it. Then we have the next two verses,
a complaint. A complaint. He's seeing someone
who might object, someone who might find cause as not to be
accepted in this matter of salvation. These two people are strangers
and eunuchs. Strangers and eunuchs. And he
says, don't let them say these things. What are they saying?
They're saying some things that are negative about themselves. They're saying, look, because
I'm a stranger, I'm not allowed in with the children of God.
This other man says, I'm a eunuch and I'm a dried tree. And God
says, look, you that are eunuchs, I'm going to give you something
better than sons, something better than daughters. What is it? My
salvation. What does He say to the stranger?
The stranger says, I'm separated from God. God says, no, if you've
taken My covenant, if you've loved Me, if you serve Me, He
says this, I'm going to take you to My holy mountain. We know
this to be glory. We know this to be the end of
our salvation, which is eternal life. And this is His promise
to us strangers, to eunuchs, to those who are blessed. He
said this, I've got others that I'm going to gather. I've got
others that I'm calling in. This salvation is for us, but
it's not just for us. There are others. There are others.
And what is the business then of the church is to call others. Those that God has determined
to gather. So those are the divisions. Now
then, let's take each division and look at it separately. First
of all, the salvation of God declared. Look, who's talking? Thus saith who? The Lord. Obviously,
this ends all doubt as to the truth of this statement. It is
the Lord speaking. It is the Lord. It is not a guess.
It is not a hope, so maybe this is God Himself. He is speaking. And what does He say to Israel,
His people? He's talking to the nation, which
is a type and picture of the true Israel of God, which is
those who believe in Christ. Those of you who trust in Christ.
You are the true Israel of God. You know that? It doesn't matter
what lineage you're from. That middle wall of partition
is taken down. There's no more Jew and Gentile,
but rather all who believe on Christ are in Christ, in the
body. There's one body, one Lord, one
Spirit, and so we all come together in Christ. Now, what does he
tell Israel? He says this, keep you judgment
and do justice. Do justice. Israel, at this time,
was going through a great affliction. They were suffering the affliction
of the invaders. They were suffering the affliction
of the Assyrians. And in this affliction, what
does God tell them to do? He says, keep judgment and do
justice. Seeing how God has saved us,
He commands us to walk in this world in a certain way. He expects
His people to walk in a certain way. Due judgment and justice. Over in Ephesians, in Ephesians
the Paul deals with this in great detail. In Ephesians chapter
5, And I don't know if you'll ever
notice this in the epistles, Paul always begins with the doctrine
and then he moves from the doctrine to the practical. And that's
very important because salvation first. If you're not saved, none
of this practical stuff applies to you. It's not going to help
you and it doesn't do you any good to try to earn salvation
by it. But this is what he says to Christians,
to believers. Be you followers of God. How?
As do your children. walk in love as Christ has loved
us and has given Himself an offering and a sacrifice to God, a sweet-smelling
savor." And so he tells us how? Walk in love. This is exactly
what he's saying, do judgment, do justice. What is justice?
Is it not to walk in love? That's just right for believers
to want to walk in love, seeing how greatly we love. And in verse
3-9, He's telling us to flee fornication and lust of the flesh. I'll tell you, this is necessary
for us. Necessary. In verses 10-17, He's talking
about proving what is acceptable. Now how do we prove what's acceptable?
We go to the Word of God. The Word of God teaches us what's
good and acceptable. In verse 18, he's telling us
to walk in the Spirit. To walk in the things of the
Spirit. We're submitting ourselves to the brethren. That's what
it is to walk in the Spirit. It's to do the works of the Spirit,
the fruit of the Spirit. Love, joy, peace, meekness, temperance,
faith. These things, against such there
is no law. And then he talks of the family.
How are we to walk in our family? Husbands, love your wives as
Christ loved the church and gave Himself for it. Wives, submit
yourselves unto your husbands as unto the Lord. This is how
believers are to walk. This is how we're to walk in
this world. Daughters and sons are to obey
their parents. Masters, servants, Serve your
masters. Masters, treat your servants
well. This is how believers are to
walk in this world. Do judgment and justice. Now, we do none of these things
for salvation. This is altogether important.
This is why Paul says the doctrine first, because if you don't understand
the doctrine, if you don't understand that Christ is all your salvation,
then you're going to try to work for it. So basically, salvation,
we don't do these things for salvation. We do these things
because of salvation. Because we've been saved. In
Romans 12, Paul says, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the
mercies of God, because of all that I said before. Romans 1
through 11, Paul says, because of all the mercies of God I just
showed you. Now, what are you to do? Present
your bodies a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God.
Listen, because it's your reasonable service. Now, if you've been
saved, you understand that it's just reasonable, isn't it? To
live for God is just reasonable for us. That's not asking more
than we could give our whole soul and self to it, and it wouldn't
be enough. We owe Him such a great debt
that we could never pay. And you know what? I'm not trying
to pay Him back, because I can't. But I long to love Him and serve
Him. And that's what Isaiah is teaching
us. The Lord is teaching us. He said,
Israel, I know you're going through trouble. I know you're going
through difficulty. But what do you do in difficulty?
Trust in Me. Isn't that just just? Isn't that
just right? Reasonable? Believer? I remember
one of the old, I believe, disciple
of John. His name escapes me right now.
I'll get it later. He was eighty and six years old. And the Romans
came to take him and kill him. And they took him, and as they
were going, he was praying, and the Roman soldiers were so inclined
to want to let him go. They saw he was a good man, and
they didn't want anything. His prayer moved them so much.
And he said, all you've got to do is just tell them, just recant. and we'll let you go." And he
said this, "...Eighty-six years has the Lord preserved me. Shall
I now forsake Him?" That's just unreasonable, isn't it? It's
unreasonable. We're not going to forsake Him.
He is all our hope, all our joy. Therefore, do justice, do judgment,
do right, if you're a believer in Christ. I know this, as we This is not
talking about doing it for salvation. Keep judgment and do justice
is not for salvation. Listen, here's the cause, look
at your text. Look at your text. He says this,
keep it for. Because my salvation is near
to come. You see, He's not saying, do
it for salvation. He's saying, do it because my
salvation is ready to come. My salvation is ready to come.
And we know this as believers in Christ, we could never keep
or do justice by nature. By our own nature, we could never
do anything pleasing to God. Romans 8, 7 says this, the carnal
mind. is enmity against God. For it is not subject to the
law of God, neither indeed can be. Do you get that can be? The
natural mind cannot, no matter what you do, cannot be subject
to the law of God. It's impossible. It's impossible
to make a natural man obedient to God. We could never do this
on our own. I know this even when I heard
of Christ. Even the first time I heard of
Christ and His perfect salvation, we could never come to Him. By nature, no man can come. This has to do with ability,
friends. The natural man has no ability to come. Jesus said that. I didn't say
that. He said, no man can. Now you don't have to be an English
scholar to understand what the word can is. It means you don't
have any ability. No man by nature has the ability
to come to Christ except, this is good because I like divine
exceptions, don't you? Except the Father, which has
sent me, draw Him. As it is written, they shall
all be taught of God. You see, how has a man then come
to Christ? A man comes to Christ because
he's drawn to Christ. He's drawn to Christ not by physical
means, not by his own will, not by his own merits. He's drawn
by the Father, by omnipotent power. I like this because salvation
is not a fragile thing. You know, sometimes we say, well,
you know, what if I said this? Or what if I did this? No, when
God wants a man, He gets him. This is how it works. When God
wanted me, He got me. There was no chance I would ever
escape. And once He got me, I didn't want to leave. He draws us. How does He draw
us? He draws us by the gospel. You know, preaching the gospel
today is a very unpopular thing. Very unpopular. People really
don't want it. They do enjoy theatrics. Plays and symphonies and things
like that. It's appealing. It's appealing
to men. But preaching, they have very
little tolerance for preaching. But you know what? This is the
only means God chose to save sinners, is preaching. Paul said,
I came not to baptize. Baptism's important, isn't it?
It's important for preachers to baptize. That's important.
But he said, that's not my purpose here. My purpose is this, to
preach the gospel. To preach the gospel. And what
does he say about anybody who doesn't like that? He said, look,
you call this foolish, it's because you're perishing. The preaching
of the gospel is foolishness to who? Them that perish. 1 Corinthians
chapter 1 and verse 17. It's to them that see it as foolish
as perishing. But it is by the declaration
of this gospel that sinners are drawn, that sinners come to Christ. It's not by law. It's not by
fear. I know that's some method of
men to think that they can make men fear of hell. They just speak
of hell and you feel the flames cooking under your seat and they
think that's going to... I don't draw anybody. I don't draw anybody. Remember, it is the goodness
of God that leadeth men to repentance. Now what is that, the goodness
of God? Because I want to preach that. If that draws me into Christ,
I want to preach that. What is that? That is this text. My salvation. That's the goodness
of God. That's the goodness of God. My
salvation is near to come. My righteousness ready to be
revealed. Now this text is speaking of
a person. A person. My salvation, God is speaking
of His Son. His Son. I don't know if you
know it or not, but this whole book that you have here in your
hands, from cover to cover, speaks only of Christ. That's it. If you're looking for how to
eat, and how to live, and how to do this and that, you messed
up. You're not judging that book right. This book is about His
Son. It's about His Son. beginning
at Moses and all the prophets. He expounded unto them in all
the Scriptures, what? The things concerning Himself. That's good. Christ is all. Christ is all from cover to cover.
When you read the Old Testament, what are you to do? You're to
find Christ. That's exactly what I've done
here. I'm showing you Christ. I've come to Isaiah 700 years
before the Lord Jesus Christ was born in the flesh, and yet
I'm preaching who? I'm preaching Christ. Because
Christ is the salvation of God. Christ is the reason that we
desire to live and do justice and judgment. He's the reason
because His salvation. God says, I'm bringing this salvation
near. You remember when our parents
sinned, What did God do when they sinned? After He exposed
them, He exposed them. They had no place to go. They
tried to cover themselves, they tried to run, they tried to hide.
Isn't that what men do? When they're exposed to sin,
they try to run and hide in their good works and their good deeds
and say, look, I was baptized when I was here. I made a decision
for Jesus here. What is that? Thick leaves. You're
covering yourself up, trying to cover yourself. God won't
abide by that. God won't abide by that. When
God exposes a man, he has nowhere to go. If you're a believer in
Christ, you understand exactly what that is. And what did he do when he exposed
him? He preached Christ. He said, the seed of the woman
shall crush the head of the serpent. Very first gospel message preached. How shall he do it? By the bruising
of his heel. Christ, the seed of the woman,
should come to destroy the works of the devil. Put away sin by
the sacrifice of himself, by the bruising of his heel. He
should put away sin. He should obtain righteousness
for us. And that was pictured to Adam
and Eve when God killed that first sacrifice. He killed that
animal and took the skin and covered them. And that's a picture
of what Christ does. Christ came and He was killed
of God. He bore our sins in His own body
on the tree. And God took that righteousness
that He made and He covers the naked sinner so that we're able
to come into the presence of God. So that we're able to be
accepted of God. This is the salvation of God,
Jesus Christ. And listen, this text says it
this way. He said, "...for my salvation
is near to come." Near to come. In other words, it hadn't come
yet. Back then, they were looking forward to His coming. But listen,
I'm here to tell you, He's already come. He's already come. That
which was to come, has come. Has come. Jesus Christ has come
in the flesh. He's come in the flesh. The seed
of the woman, the Son of God, was made flesh and dwelt among
us. and see what was the purpose
of him. It was to destroy the works of the devil, sin, death,
and hell. He was to put down all rebellion
and disobedience by establishing righteousness. The spotless,
sinless Son of God came to restore. I like that, to restore. In the
Psalm it says it this way, I came to restore that which I took
not away. You see, Christ didn't take away
our righteousness, yet He did what? He came to restore it.
He came to fulfill it. For by one man's disobedience
many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one are many
made righteous. But I want you to know that this
salvation has more to do than just the righteousness of Christ. It has to do with An atonement. An atonement. You see, God could
not let sin go unpunished. Therefore, in grace and power,
God took the sins of His people and imputed them to His Son. He imputed them to His Son. He charged them to His Son. The
Scripture says this in 2 Corinthians 5, "...to wit, God was in Christ
reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses
to them." This is the Gospel. This is the goodness of God,
isn't it? That God was not willing to impute sin to His people,
but rather He imputed our sins to His Son. And this is the message
of reconciliation. For He hath made Him to be sin
for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness
of God in Him. This is the salvation of God.
This was not done by us. It's altogether important to
see that salvation is something done completely outside of us.
It was in the purpose of God from eternity. Salvation is not
God's plan B. It was always God's plan A. He
had a people. He chose a people. He purposed
a people to be saved. These are called the elect. The
elect of God that were chosen of Him in eternity. God says,
I will save them. I will make them holy. And I'm
going to do it by one way, by my Son. I'm going to do it by
my Son." And so when he said this, my salvation is near to
come, this is what his will was. He said, I'm going to save them.
I'm going to send my Savior and He's going to save them. This
is not a question, this was a statement. He said, my salvation is coming. You know how many people try
to stop Him from coming? You know Satan tried all that he
could to stop Christ from coming? And he failed on every front.
Why? Because God determined him to
come. And he came. And God determined that he'd
be successful. And he was successful. This is
a successful Savior. I'm not talking about an iffy
Savior. Not an iffy salvation. A sure salvation. I don't need
an iffy salvation. I need something sure. Something
that I can rest my soul on. And it's on this that Jesus Christ
came into the world to save sinners. And He saved them. And He did
it outside of me. I wasn't even there. And He did
it. But I tell you, I was there.
When Christ came and lived and died, I was in Christ. He was my representative man.
Now I wasn't there when Adam sinned, but you know what? I
got his death. I got his sin. His sin transferred
to me. And it transferred to you. But this is the good news, so
is my salvation the same way. My salvation was not something
I did. It was something my representative
did. He did it for me. This is the salvation that God
has drawn near. Child of God, behold the great
and precious promises. The revelation of God is that
we have this. We've been given a new heart.
If you believe this, if you trust this, I want you to know, this
is no mere act of your will. This is the power of God. That
faith in Christ is not a decision. It's the power of God. It's the
will of God that you believe. If you believe it all, it's because
God willed it. If you're born again... I remember
somebody talking about a man who was a free will preacher
and he says, you know, you've got to be born again. And he
said, let me tell you how. And he couldn't. How can a man tell you how to
be born again? No! You must be born from above. That's what the word means. Born
from above. God must give you life. I like the scripture in John
1, it says, as many as received Him. I like that word received. You
know why? It speaks of a beggar receiving
bread from one greater. Our Lord Jesus Christ, when He
came to me, I was the beggar. And He offered me the bread of
life, and I received it. You know what? I received it
because I had no other choice. I was dead, dying. You see, I
didn't receive it as an equal. That's accepted. You know, a
lot of people say, you need to accept Jesus. Nowhere in Scripture. Nowhere in Scripture. Why? Because accept has the idea of
equals. You have a contract between two
people, they're equals, right? You can accept the contract or
reject the contract. Not the way it says it. We received
Him. Why did you receive Him? Why is this salvation your salvation? because we were born not of blood."
In other words, if my son ever believes it won't be because
of me, not of blood, not of kin, nor of the will of the flesh. I'm saved not by my will. I'm
not born again by my will. And I'm not born again by your
will. You know, I can will for my son
to believe, but I can't do anything. My will won't give him life. What gives life is the will of
God. The will of God. This morning, as God comes in
and His Word is preached, some of you believe, some of you don't.
What's the difference? God makes a difference. He said,
My salvation is near to come. And His salvation has come. And
His salvation comes to His people. He gives them life. How? Through
faith. Through faith. Do you believe
on the Son of God? Do you believe on the Son of
God? That's important because a lot
of people can say, I believe. Isn't it easy? You can go, I
believe. Two words. I believe. I believe.
What does that mean? To believe on the Son of God.
What is it about the Son that you must believe? You must believe He is God. Only God can save me. My salvation
is no mere thing that a mortal man can do. Nothing an angel
could do. God must do it. God must do it. Therefore, God was manifest in
the flesh without controversy, without argument. God was manifest
in the flesh without argument. No controversy here. We who believe
understand that. We know Him. He is God manifest
in the flesh. Jesus said this, if you believe
not that I am, you shall die in your sins. So in order to
believe on Christ, you must believe He is God manifest in the flesh.
Second of all, you must believe that He is the Christ. The Christ. What does that mean, Christ?
It's anointed one, chosen one, the Messiah. And in order to
be the Christ, do you realize what you would have to do? You
would have to have all of these Scriptures fulfilled. Everything
in this book that prophesied of Christ had to be fulfilled. Not one could be missing. He
had to be born of the Virgin. He had to be born in Bethlehem. He had to be the righteous Son
of God. He had to die for the sins of
His people. Why? The book prophesied. In order to be Christ, He had
to do these things. Now then, I'll tell you this.
Do you believe He was successful? You don't think this is a hang-up.
On some people, it is. This modern religion of the world
says that Christ died for everyone, without exception. Now I ask
you, was He successful? The only thing you can answer
to that would be no, because there are people in hell today.
I tell you, He did not come to die for everyone. Who did He
come to die for? As many as the Father gave Him. That's who. He said, I came to
do the will of the Father. And this is the will of Him that
sent me, that of all He hath given me, I should lose zero,
nothing. See what a successful Savior
looks like? How many does a successful Savior lose? Nothing. Nothing. Why? Because he actually atoned
for their sins. He actually paid for their sins.
And God cannot be just and demand twice payment. He cannot be just and demand
twice payment. This is why he says, Comfort
ye my people, for the Lord hath received double for all her sins. All her sins. You see, I'm talking
about a successful Savior. Now, is this your Savior? He's
my Savior. My Savior is a victorious Savior.
My Savior is God's salvation that has come into the world,
who has obtained righteousness by His obedience and by His death. Let's move on. I want to get
to this last portion here. The complaint. Let's take a brief look at verse
2. Blessed is the man that doeth
this, and the son of man that layeth hold on it, that keepeth
the sabbath from polluting it, that keepeth his hands from doing
evil. Now I want you to know this blessed
man, first of all, is Jesus. The blessed man is Jesus. Who
else has done righteous and justly? Who else is the salvation of
God but the man Jesus Christ? Who else has laid hold on righteousness
and salvation? Who else has kept the Sabbath
from polluting it but Christ? Christ alone is the blessed man. But I also want you to see this.
It's you who believe. You are too the blessed man.
Why? Because by grace you have laid
hold of God's salvation. By grace you have believed on
the Son of God. By grace you have not polluted
the Sabbath of God. Now the Sabbath, we don't talk
about the Sabbath because the Sabbath was part of the law. We're not Sabbath keepers as
far as days and months and weeks and years. This is Christ. Christ is God's Sabbath. You
could read that yourself in Hebrews chapter 4. But Christ is our
Sabbath. And so those who believe in Christ
have kept the Sabbath. Now then, look at the complaint
of these two, the stranger and the eunuch. The stranger, it
says, let the son of the stranger that has joined himself to the
Lord speak, saying, the Lord hath utterly separated me from
his people. Believers in Christ, we were
strangers. By nature, we were strangers
from the covenants of promise. By nature, we did not deserve
the grace and mercy and salvation of God. And I know this, at times, you
as believers in Christ feel as though God is estranged from
you. Who among you, believer, has
not felt estranged from God? At times, we feel distant from
our Father. At times we feel as though He
has utterly forsaken us. David wrote of that. He said,
hath God cast us off? Has God forsaken us forever?
At times, believers, we feel this and we have this opposition
and we say within ourselves, we're strangers. How could God
forsake us? And what does God say to that
stranger who has been brought in to the covenant of grace?
He said, don't say that. Don't say that. What does he
say to the stranger? He says this, verse 6, the son
of the stranger that's joined himself to the Lord to serve
Him, do you serve God? Do you love the name of the Lord?
Do you keep His Sabbath, which means believing in Christ, resting
in Christ? Have you taken hold of His covenant
of grace? He said, listen, even them will
I bring to my holy mountain. and make them joyful in the house
of my prayer. Their burnt offerings and their
sacrifices are accepted upon mine altar, and mine house shall
be called a house of prayer for all people." He says this to
you, stranger. He says, I will bring you to
my holy hill. I'll bring you to my Son. I'll bring you to my house of
worship. I'll bring you to glory. I'll
bring you to eternal life. Don't say you're a stranger.
Why? Because you've been reconciled.
You who love God, you who serve God, you who believe on Christ.
Listen, God says, don't say you're estranged from Me. Why? The Scripture
tells us plainly, He says, I will never leave you nor forsake you. I will never leave you." And
this idea of the eunuch. The eunuch is one who cannot
produce family. These are men that were in servitude
and slavery, and they would mutilate them so that they should not
have children. And the eunuch says, I'm a dry tree. Believer,
do you not at times feel so dry and dead? Because you cannot
produce righteousness. Isn't that right with us? We
can't do righteous. Even when we would do righteous, sin is
mixed with all we do. O wretched man that I am, Paul
says, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? At times,
believer, our sins overwhelm us and we can't help but feel
dry and dead. But he said, look, don't say
that. Don't say you're a dry tree. Why? Because you have the
righteousness of Christ. You have the righteousness of
Christ. He said, I'm going to give you something better than
sons and daughters. I'm going to give you something better
than man's righteousness. You know, Adam had a righteousness,
didn't he? Right until he sinned. It was gone forever. That's not
a good righteousness to have because there's a possibility
of death. You can't keep it. You and I
couldn't keep it. Adam couldn't keep it. We can't
keep it. But there's something better than this. I'm going to
give you a name. You know what name you have? You have Christ's
name. You have His name. I believe
it's in Jeremiah. The Lord Jesus Christ is called
Jehovah Tiskanu. The Lord our righteousness. The Lord our righteousness. You
know what He calls His bride? The Lord our righteousness. We
get the same name as Him. Why? Because I have the same
righteousness as He does. That's the righteousness He gave
me. That's the salvation that was drawing near. That was the
salvation He accomplished. That's the salvation He gave
me. It's mine. So therefore, believer,
why should the living complain? Why should the living man complain?
You complain? Believer, do you complain? Why? You have no need to complain.
You have the salvation of God. Why would you complain? You have
everything you need. And so if this body were to decay
and fall away and die, so what? You still have all you need.
All you need is in Christ. And this is an exhortation then
to us who are believers. He said this, I will gather,
I will gather, let me read this at the last. He said, the Lord
which gathereth the outcasts of Israel saith, I will gather
others to Him besides those that I have gathered unto Him. So
what then is the business of the stranger and the eunuch?
It is to preach the Gospel. I know this. Everybody feels
that you may be at the end. Well, so may my children. They're
young. They may be at the end of their life. I don't know.
But I'll tell you this, as long as you're here, we have business. We have business. Witness of
the salvation of God. Testify to others. Encourage
the saints. Love them. Serve them. Honor
them. That's what we're here to do.
Witness of Christ. Point men to Christ. I know you
know men that don't know Christ. Point them to Christ. Show them
the salvation of God. And maybe, by the grace of God,
He might gather them. Wouldn't that be a blessing?
To be used of God for such things. I pray God will bless this to
you, I really do.