Isaiah 33. What I want to focus on is verse
17. Your eyes will see the king in
his beauty with a land that stretches afar, or in view a land that
stretches afar. Now, We cannot know with absolute
certainty just which historical event the prophet is referring
to. Most Old Testament prophecies
have both what we might call an immediate fulfillment and
then an ultimate fulfillment. And this prophecy is like that. Some suspect that he's referring
to King Hezekiah, because Hezekiah had been threatened by Sennacherib. And they had come to the walls
of the city with demands. And they spoke those demands
in Hebrew, and they were asked not to do that, because they
didn't want the threats and whatnot. to be understood by the people
inside the city and discourage them. So they were a people of an odd language. And that's referenced
here in this particular chapter. We read about that. And so it
may have been that event But what was being promised was,
and we know the kind of situation that was being referred to, is
that the people had seen their king. You'll have to excuse me
for this. I can't figure out why. I can't
find out just how to keep that from spinning around underneath
my chin. They had seen their king terrified
and made low. And you know, under a political
system that has kings, kings back then were not merely the
legislators and rulers, they were also the head of the military. And not just the head of the
military like our president, who is the commander in chief,
but he never goes to war. Those kings went to war. They
led their people in battle. And if he is or looks defeated,
that's very discouraging to the people. And so the word of promise
by the prophet is this, your eyes will see the king in his
beauty. Now we normally don't use the
word beauty to refer to a man. We talk about women are beautiful,
men are handsome. At least that's what I was taught
when I was a kid. Maybe it's different nowadays, but rarely
have I ever heard someone refer to a beautiful man. So why would
they say, you'll see the king in his beauty? Well, it wasn't
talking so much, that is, in the natural fulfillment, that
whatever king this was, that he was a handsome, good-looking
individual. The word beauty can be applied in many ways,
but in here, I'm sure what it was indicating, they would see
the king at his palace or on his throne in his royal garments,
crown on his head, secure in his kingship. exhibiting all
the attributes, all the characteristics of a successful king. The purpose of a king, above
all things, is the protection of his people. Admittedly, most
people who gain a crown like that have the idea that the people
are there to serve his needs and wants. But it's supposed
to be the other way around. And that's why it's so important
to people that the king be firmly established, that he be safe
and secure, because there's no way the nation can be secure
if the king is not secure. Now, judgment and mercy. are often declared to the same
people. It says here in verse 13, you who are far away, hear what
I have done. Now this is God speaking. And
you who are near, acknowledge my power. Now look over to Ephesians
chapter 2. 17, speaking of our Lord Jesus Christ, Paul says, He came and preached
peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. And on the day of Pentecost,
Peter said that the promise is to you and to your children,
to them that are near and to them that are far off. Now, the
Bible was written by Jews, because that's the people to whom God
entrusted the oracles of God, the truth of God, the scriptures.
They were the one that recorded the words of God. And so they
spoke from a Jewish perspective. And so from the Jewish perspective,
they were the ones that were near. And then all the other
nations were the ones who were far off. Now, in judgment, and we know
this, judgment, words of judgment are spoken indiscriminately to
everyone. all have sinned and fall short
of the glory of God, that means that words of judgment are applicable
to everybody. And often the Jews didn't take
this to heart because they didn't realize or didn't take to heart
the fact that words of judgment were spoken
to them who were near as well as to the Gentile nations who
were far off. Now if we are to be blessed by
God according to our behavior, then all men are on exactly the
same plane. The law of God is the same for
everyone. And if we're to be judged by
the law of God, all of us are going to be found wanting. If
you'll remember that Belteshazzar, I can't remember if it was Belteshazzar
or just Belshazzar. There's two names in the book
of Daniel, Belteshazzar and Belshazzar, and I get mixed up as to who's
who. But he was actually the grandson of Nebuchadnezzar, and
he had the throne after Nebuchadnezzar did, and he threw one of their
wild parties. And in the midst of it, the fingers
of a man's hand appeared and wrote on the wall, me name, me
name, Tekel Upherson. You've been weighed in the balances,
weighed in the balances, and you have been found wanting,
and the kingdom will be taken from you. And for all of us,
for all of us, is the same kind of judgment. If we stand before
the judge of all to be judged by what we have done, And therefore the Lord says,
you who are far away, hear what I have done. And he's saying
to those Gentile nations, you are being proud. You are coming
against my people. You are breaking my laws. You
are murdering. You are pillaging. You're being horrible. Listen to what I've done to people
that act like that. But then he says this. You who
are near, acknowledge my power." Now, the Jews at this point under
Hezekiah had been about as faithful as they'd ever been, I suppose,
if indeed this is the times of Hezekiah. But among the most
faithful people is a tendency not to trust God. to rely on
our own power, to rely on our own will, our
own determination. That's natural to us, isn't it?
And we even go so far, or many do, among preachers of the Christian
religion, at least they claim that's what they are, and they
say, that God has acted towards all people equally in grace,
and now it's left up to people to decide whether or not they
want that grace. And I remember hearing the daughter
of a famous evangelist of the 1900s, and she was on a discussion
group at the end of a religious show, and she made this statement.
God is a gentleman. and he will not go where he's
not wanted. The people of Jericho would have
a problem with that. God doesn't have to go anywhere,
he's already there. God goes where he wants, he does
what he wants. Nebuchadnezzar himself learned that first-hand
by personal experience. Nebuchadnezzar was the most powerful
man in the world in his day. He was the leader of the greatest
empire of that day. And he sent his armies, and they
pillaged and murdered and gathered to him great wealth. They moved
peoples. You know, we hear about the Jews,
that they were taken up to Babylon, yes? And then people from other
countries were taken to replace the Jews. That's where the Samaritans
came from. And one night he was out walking
on the wall, city wall, and I think, and I hope I'm not getting my
Bible stories mixed up, but it was wide enough for six chariots
to ride on. That's a pretty wide wall, when
you consider the top of the wall wasn't as thick as the bottom.
And he was saying to himself, look at this that you have built.
Aren't you something? That's basically what he was
saying. Taking great pride in his achievement. And God said
to him, by way of a dream interpreted by Daniel, I'll show you who's
in charge. For seven years, you will live
like a beast of a field. You will eat grass. You who think
You're the highest of men. For seven years, you'll live
as though you're not a man at all. And then Nebuchadnezzar
seemed to have learned his lesson, because he said, when my sanity
was restored to me. He didn't say, when I finally
got my marbles back in my head, or when I straightened myself
up. He said, when my sanity was restored to me. It was taken
from me by someone bigger than me, and I only got it back because
he was pleased to restore it. And when he did, I extolled God
Most High. And he begins to talk about God,
and he ends with this, who does as he wills. Among the armies
of heaven, among the inhabitants of the earth, none can stay his
hand. Nobody has the power to stop
him. or say unto him, what are you doing? What does he mean,
they can't say, what are you doing? They can't call, they
don't even have the right to call him into account for what
he does. And then they come up with this idea, God's a gentleman,
he won't go where he isn't asked. If God never went where he wasn't
asked, he never would have showed up in Bethlehem, they weren't
asking for him there. He never showed up in Jerusalem,
they weren't interested in Him there. He never showed up anywhere,
because nobody was interested in His presence until He came
and took over. And so He says to those that
are near, that nation whom He had chosen as His own nation
and whom He had given many privileges and many promises, And they're
shaking in their boots. They're scared to death of this
army outside the gates. And he says, acknowledge my power. Now, has this no voice to us? Are we not easily troubled? Are we not easily turned upside
down by the events of the world. Things are going along, we think
they're going along good, we begin making our plans, you know,
and we've got our mind out there, year, two years, ten years, whatever,
our expectations, and boom, something happens. It changes our present,
and it just topples our hopes for the future. What we had planned,
it's all gone. Some people react with anger.
That's the natural reaction when you don't get what you want.
It's what children do, isn't it? Mommy, I want this. No, you can't
have that. And then, phew, you know, they
start reacting in anger. Takes a long time to train them,
doesn't it, that that's not the proper reaction to mom and dad's
authority. But we do that with God. We may not realize we're
angry with God, but we're all upset. We're refusing to acknowledge
His right to do with us whatever He wants to do. But there's another thing we're
refusing to acknowledge. His power. His power to work
all things together for our good. Child of God. Are you enjoying
your life right now? Is everything going pretty good? There's nothing wrong with that. Nothing wrong with enjoying it.
Don't get used to it. Don't found your happiness upon
it. Because in a moment, it can all
be taken away. And if God ever It's the idea
that all the pleasant things He has sent your way are becoming
a trap and a snare to you. He will take them away. And to be able in that day to
say, it is the Lord, let Him do what He will. The Lord gave, the Lord has taken
away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
He gave, He took away, and if His wisdom and goodness He sees
fit, to give again. That's fine. And if He doesn't,
He's got the right to go that way too. You know, those were the words
of Job. And he was really brought down by the horrible things that
had happened to him. I mean, his entire family. All
of his children, they were all grown, had families of their
own. Every one of them killed, them and their families. Can
you imagine that? What do you have, about 10 kids,
something like that? And that must, you know, back
then, well, we all rejoice, you know, as our household begins
to expand. You know, Bonnie and I got three
kids. We love them dearly, you know. The only thing we got against
them is they moved away. But other than that, you know,
perfectly happy with them. They got kids. They got lives. Things are going
pretty good. Tomorrow we could get a phone
call. And even though they don't all live near one another, God could ordain it that we would
lose all three of our children and all the grandchildren and
sons-in-law and daughters-in-law involved. And suddenly she and I would
become the end of a line for our generation. Devastating. And in the midst of that, and
this didn't mean that Job wasn't in agony of soul. He said this, I know that my Redeemer lives. And in the latter day, He will
stand on the earth. And even though concerning my
body, worms shall eat my flesh. He said, I've lost all my kids
and someday I'm going to die too. We're all heading that way. He said, Yet in my flesh shall
I see God. With my eyes, and not with another's
eyes who sees God and tells me about what he saw. I'll see. He might well have said, I will
see the king in his beauty. If you are a believer in the
Lord Jesus Christ, from the time you believe until the time you
arrive in the presence of God faultless and full of joy, there
will be continual troubles and trials, things that will make
you afraid, things that'll make you angry, things that'll make
you, that'll bring your head down to tears and you'll think
that you're never going to rise again. You know, I've mentioned a couple
of times to some of you anyway, 50 years ago, some day in June of
1973, I walked across the platform at Memorial Field House, red
gown, flat hat, and they gave me my high school diploma. I remember how exciting it was
at that time. Oh, youth is, you're just full
of excitement. When you're young, you don't understand old people. I didn't either. But you know
why? Why do they want to get up and do things? Why do they
seem kind of beaten down? All such hope. And so you're about 18. Maybe
you go off to college. But I know this, once you're
done with your education, the world changes. And the rest of your life, you
will discover this. Life is not easy. And true joy cannot come from
what happens in this life. true joy must arise from somewhere
else. But he says, acknowledge my power,
and that, if we can acknowledge his power, I mean, from the depths
of our heart, at all times, as his people, understand that no
matter how bad it looks, no matter how bad it gets, no matter how
fierce the enemy seems, no matter how much ground it seems that
he has taken, no matter how much it seems like those who are with
us, how many of them have fallen by the wayside. David said, and
I'll apologize if I don't get the numbers exactly right, but
he says, if a thousand fall at my right and ten thousand, this
is my left, isn't it? If a thousand fall at my left
and ten thousand at my right, yet will I not fear." Why? The Lord is my refuge and strength. That's why. Sometimes I hear about or read
about people who I thought were honest-to-God believers. They may be even preached. And
you really thought, this is the real deal. And then all at once,
for one reason or another, they're gone. And I think, what happened? And will this happen to me? Will I be among those who for
many years was able to conduct myself enough like a child of
God that other people believed it? Only to find out. Only to
find out. I was just masquerading. I had
a good costume on. You know, if I look at me, the answer to will you persevere
is no, I won't. I would fall 10,000 times a day. But you see, and thanks be to
God for this, it doesn't depend on me. And God has taught me that. And
He has to keep reteaching me. You that are near, acknowledge
my power. Rest your overworked bones. in the knowledge that my power
is going to handle everything. And then this promise to those
who are among his people, your eyes will see the king in
his beauty. Your eyes will see the king high
and lifted up. seated upon a throne. Your eyes
will see the King in all the glory of his royal rites and
all the demonstration of his infinite power. I love the promises of the scriptures. There's no ifs, ands, or buts
about them. Notice this. Your eyes will see
the King in His beauty, in all His regal majesty. You'll see
it. Oh, you mean I'll see it if I
behave? No, you'll see it. You mean I'll
see it if I prove to be a faithful Christian? No, you will see it. And I ask you, Is there really anything else
you want to see? Well, there's plenty of other things we'd like
to see, but anything else kind of pales in comparison. In fact,
without the confidence that we will see our Lord in His beauty and all His regal majesty and
glory, without that, what's the use of anything else? I think one of the most painful
things that the unbeliever must confront as he approaches the end of life
is this. It was all for nothing. Because they don't have anything. They may have enjoyed a great
deal of their life as they were going through it. But as they
draw near the end of it, if they're atheistic, then all they're facing
is oblivion, non-existence. What was the use of any of it? If they were a believer in a
false god, they may have a false hope of things to come, but the
reality of it is, At least as I see it in the scriptures, as
I feel it in my own soul, if Jesus Christ is not there in
all of his glorious majesty, and if I am not going to have
the privilege of seeing him like that, then there was no value
to my life at all. and it's insignificant whether
it was happy or sad. Oh, to see the king in his beauty.
By faith, we already do. But faith, by its very nature,
longs to be sight. Now, we live by faith, not by
sight, because it's not the time for sight. But we got the promise. Now, by the description given
to us in the gospel, we saw our king when he didn't look so majestic. In fact, we saw our king killed, beaten, mocked. crucified, and to all that our
eyes could tell, defeated. And I don't know about you, but we look out on our world.
Is there any real respect or honor for Jesus Christ in this
world? Oh, there have been times when
people at least gave him lip service, and they would act like they're
Christians because, well, if you didn't, you couldn't get
elected to political office, couldn't run a business, things
like that. But has there ever been a time in this world where
Jesus Christ was held in honor by the majority of the people. You and I live in a land where there is no beauty to be
seen in Jesus Christ. What did Isaiah say later, chapter
53? There is no beauty that we should
desire him. And if we depend, even as believers,
if we depend, if our confidence of things to come is founded
upon the things that we see, we're not going to have any confidence. We at all times are to be people
of faith, which means at all times we're relying on promises. We're not relying on things possessed. We're not relying on things seen. We are relying on things told
to us. Now there's nothing, and understand
what I mean by this, there's nothing going on in this world,
nothing going on in my life that testifies to me that someday
I shall see Christ in all his glory. In fact, there's nothing
in this world and nothing about my life the way it's gone. that can testify to me that there's
any such person as Jesus Christ anyway. Oh, there's some historical
evidence that there was a rabbi over there in Israel in the first century, a man named
Jesus, and that he ended up getting crucified. You can find historical
accounts of that. But Is there anything in this
world or in your experience that testifies to you that this Jesus
is the Messiah, the Son of God? We're relying entirely on what's
written in this book. And we would be crazy to do so.
Is it not true? We'd be crazy to do so if there
were not some supernatural act on the part of God that enabled
us to believe what is, quite frankly, completely
contrary to what we see. But here's the promise. Your
eyes will see the King in His beauty. What's that going to be like? I don't know. Not even the Apostle John knew.
What? Apostles don't know what it's
going to be like to see Christ in his beauty? Well, I guess
they do now, but they didn't while they were here. And how do we know that? Well, John
said, Beloved, now we are the children of God, and it does
not appear yet, that is, it's not been revealed, what we shall
be. But we know this, when he appears,
we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. So, well, there's nothing in
there that says that he didn't know what Christ looked like?
Well, think of this. If we're going to be like Him
when we see Him, and John says, but we don't know what that's
going to be, we don't know what we're going to be like, that
means he doesn't know what Christ is like. He saw a vision of Him
on Patmos, and what he saw in vision was enough to make him
fall at Christ's feet as a dead man. your eyes will see the King in
His beauty." There was a time there was no beauty in Him that
you and I desired Him. We were perfectly satisfied with
the beauty of this world, the beauty of ourselves, and the
beauty of the things we wanted. And it was not until God in sovereign
grace came to us and revealed to us The world's not beautiful. You're not beautiful. I'm not
beautiful. Nothing's beautiful. It's all
been wrecked. It's all been messed up. And he enabled us to see. I hope I can get this in words
that will convey what I'm thinking here. Isaiah 52 ends with Christ
being marred more than any man. So much so he's unrecognizable
as a man. No wonder it says there's no
beauty that we should desire him. Isn't this true? Is not the sight of Christ crucified,
is that not to you the most beautiful thing ever in earth? Not Eden can compare in beauty. They looked on Christ crucified
and said, there's a cursed man. He's a nothing to nobody. We
look upon the bleeding form and say, there's my God, there's
my King. And I know it looks like he's
losing, but he's winning. And we're on the other side of
the history and we say, yeah, he was winning and he won. And
though we don't know what it looks like, we've not seen it
yet, we know that He is now secure upon His throne at the right
hand of His Father, that He is robed in glory, and we long to
see that. Nothing excites me more than
this, the prospect of seeing my Lord vindicated before the
world. The fact that every knee will
bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord. And you know
why they'll be compelled to do that? They'll see the king in
his beauty and say, oh, we were wrong, so very, very wrong. But
many of them, there'll be no hope at that point. But we'll
see him in his beauty. And now for the kicker. When
we do, we will be like Him. Now you ponder on that. In this world, age takes away
beauty. Still a little startled when
I look in the mirror. What happened? But in the world to come, It's the other way around. Even our youth will appear, shall
I say, ugly. And I'm not just talking about
physical beauty, but we're kind of comparing it to that. We shall be like Him, glorious,
righteous, perfect. Everything that we want to be
now as believers, we shall be and much, much more. We will
see the king in his beauty, we will view a land that stretches
far, eternal life. He says, in your thoughts you
will ponder the former tarot, you will remember what it was like to live under
a sense of doom. But you will say, where is that
chief officer? Where is the one that took the
revenue? Where is the one that said I owed money? Where is the officer in charge
of the towers, the prisons and the jails? Where is the accuser? He's nowhere to be found, is
he? Why? The king, in all his beauty,
will see it. The whole world will see it.
And it will stop every mouth that ever spoke anything against
him or anything against his people. Well, I hope that we can be blessed
by thinking about seeing the Lord Jesus Christ in all his
glorious beauty. Oh, this business of salvation's
a much bigger thing than we initially thought. It's more than heaven,
as people normally think of heaven. It's more than the eternal vacation. It's being able to behold our
God in all of his glory. and survive the sight, and not
only that, to be made like him and to be with him forever. Well, we're going to sing hymn
509, and we're going to sing it because last night I was talking
to Bonnie and I said, we'll talk about the king and his beauty,
and the sands of time are sinking has a verse about that. And it
does, but then the sands of time are sinking has, I think, nearly
25 verses to it, and there's only four of them in our hymnal.
And that one's not in there, but I'll tell you what that verse says.
Maybe we'll get it in our chorus book sometime. Not all 25 verses,
not all of them are worth singing. But one of the stanzas of that
wonderful hymn says, the king in all his beauty doth on Mount Zion stand. It were a well-spent journey,
those seven deaths lay between. Rather, I don't know what the
Lord has before us between now and the time we stand in his
presence, but whatever it is, whatever happens between now
and then, it'll be worth it. In fact, Paul says it's not even
worthy to be compared. with what we shall be when we
behold our King in His beauty.