That's good, isn't it? Those
he kills, he makes alive. Paul said, when the commandment
came, I died. But then he said, no, I live. Nevertheless, I live. Yet not
I, Christ. liveth in me." Then he says,
come boldly to the throne of grace, the Lord will take you
in. That's good. Alright, back to
Isaiah 55. After this message I may say
with Job, after the Lord spoke to Job over there in chapter
42, Job said, I've spoken things too wonderful for me. Things
which I knew not. In other words, I've said things
that I don't know much about. Look at verses 8 and 9 with me
again. Isaiah 55. God says, My thoughts, for My
thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,
saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher
than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My
thoughts than your thoughts. Big subject in God's high thoughts
and ways. Now, as I said, when we talk
about God, we really don't know too much of whom we are talking
about. Job said in the beginning of
his book, he said, God doeth great things that are past finding
out. And then young Elihu, Job started
talking too much, along with his friends, and young Elihu
rebuked him and reminded him by saying, touching the Almighty,
we cannot find him out. They were all trying to figure
out why God did what He did. His ways are pacifying it out. They're too great. And David
wrote this in Psalm 8, one of my favorite psalms. You know
it well. Oh Lord, our Lord, how excellent is Thy name in all
the earth, who has set Thy glory above the heaven. And when I
consider thy heavens the work of thy fingers, the moon and
the stars which thou hast to ordain, what is man, that thou
art mindful of him, or the Son of man, that thou business him?"
God is so great. The heavens declare the glory
of God, but just a little of it. Just a little bit of heaven
and the earth with all their amazing mysteries and Wondrous
works are merely, Scripture says, the work of his fingers. He did it in a day, Stan. You
know, we look at beautiful, I'm talking about God's highways
and thoughts. We look at beautiful paintings
by these Italian masters and these French, these old fellows. Mindy and I went to Paris one
time, went in the Louvre, you know, and saw those paintings
that were, some of them 15, 20 feet high by the old masters,
so-called, and we were amazed. But any day, any given day, one
sunset by God Almighty far eclipses anything that man could ever
put on canvas, just one. And we look at man's, the structures
man builds, the pyramids, you know. Some of you have seen the
pyramids in Mexico and Egypt and all that. One mountain far
exceeds any of those structures. And we marvel at modern technology. Don't we? I do. My poor little brain is pretty
amazed by modern technology. Now, man has made these computers
and all, these computers that do such... Man did it. It's this
brain, this brain of man that made those computers to do that.
Well, God made the brain. And God said he made man in his
own image, not the express image, mind you, just the similarity. Now, I'm trying to talk about,
you see, I'm trying to talk about our high God, how big, I feel
like a little kid when you say, how big was that? He says, oh,
big. How big? This big. I didn't want to come close.
But all that man does is, some of his attainments are pretty
amazing. Well, God made man. And I started
to take you back to Psalm 19, but I'm not going to do it for
the sake of time. But the things concerning God's
creative glory, that's what Psalm 19, Nancy, you and I love Psalm
19, those two books, the book of creation that declares God's
glory and the written word, the commandments of the Lord that
are clean, making wise and simple and so forth. God's creative
glory is amazing. God's creation. Heavens declare His glory. The
firmament showeth His handiwork. Day unto day others speak. But
it's really nothing. These are just the works of His
fingers. It's really nothing. Moses, after seeing all that
he saw, Moses asked the Lord, show me Your glory. Show me your
glory. Marvin mentioned that. Show me
your glory. I mean, what is the greatest
thing about you? You know, I have read these verses
before. You've read them with me. We've
looked at them before. And we've taken them a little
bit out of context. Now, when God Almighty declares
His glory, His greatest glory. He doesn't talk about the creation.
He doesn't talk about the moon and the stars and so forth. And now, we're talking about
the glory of God's person, and God Himself declares in one word,
very concisely, in one word, what He is. Do you know what
that one word is at best? That's right. Holy. Holy. Holy. That's what the seraphims
cry all the time, right now. There is no night, but that one
continuous day. That's all they do before the
throne. They cry one to another. Holy. Holy. Holy. Holy. Now once again, I'm speaking
things too wonderful for me, but holy has something to do
with purity, cleanness. Holy means sacred. Holy means something that is
separate from everything else. Holy, as one preacher pointed
out to me one time, means other than, something other than. infinitely higher, infinitely
better, bigger than anything or anyone. Moses, in his song,
Moses' song, that they're singing right now in glory, is this,
Who is like Thee? Glorious in holiness. That's what they are singing
right now in heaven, in glory. I like to call heaven glory. And so God in all that He is
and all that He does is holy, infinitely higher than us, separate
from, other than us. So His ways, His thoughts are
just not our way, not our thought, not like us. In verse 8, he says,
my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways.
They're just not. In Psalm 50, he says, thou thoughtest
I was altogether such a one as yourself. It's not even. And he says, as the heavens are
higher than the earth, that's how vastly different we are. And God's thoughts are unsearchable. incomprehensible, the depth of
them unfathomable. God's ways are higher infinitely. Let me turn real quickly to Psalm
36. It says, His mercy, O Lord, is in the heavens. His faithfulness
reaches to the clouds. And I just told you the secret. I got ahead of myself. But when
these verses here begin, verse 8 begins with the word for, doesn't
it? For my thoughts are not your thoughts. You never begin a sentence
with for. You don't begin a sentence with
for. You say for because you're going to say something in reference
to what you just said. Alright? Is it called a conjunction, Jeanette? Come on. You've been out of school
too long. I think it's a conjunction. It
connects what went before. For. In other words, he said
something, and he says, for, for this reason. So this is why
we need to go back and see what he's talking about, his thoughts
and his ways being so much higher, as the heavens are higher than
the earth. So he said, for. Something he wrote before is
why he said, for. My thoughts are not your thoughts.
My way is not your way. What does he say? All right,
look at this. And this is a revelation to me.
He says in verse 7, let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous
man his thoughts, and let him return unto the Lord, and he,
the Lord, will have mercy upon him. And to our God, for he will
abundantly pardon for my thoughts are not your thoughts, no, my
way is your way. I'm so much higher than you.
That is his mercy. But you never thought of those
in that reference. This is what God is talking about.
His mercy. His pardon. His forgiveness. His abundant pardon, He said.
Abundantly pardoned. And what the Lord is talking
about that is infinitely higher than our thoughts and our ways
is His mercy and His abundant pardon. That's His greatest glory. His highest thoughts, God's highest
thoughts are thoughts of mercy to lowly sinners. God's greatest
glory is our greatest need. Mercy. As he told Moses, here's
what he told Moses. When Moses said, show me your
glory, what did God say? Okay, he said, I'm going to make
my goodness pass before you. I already showed him the burning
bush and all of these things, the parted water, but God said,
I'm going to make my goodness pass before you. He said, I will
be gracious. My thoughts are not your thoughts.
My ways are not your ways. You're not like this, God said.
You're not like this. I am. I will show mercy to whom
I will show mercy. Sovereign mercy. But I will show
mercy. It's infinite glory and great glory that God will be
merciful. You see, as holy as God is, that's
how sinful man is. As pure and spotless and perfect
and separate as God is from sin, as pure as God is, the very opposite
extreme is what man is. When God describes man before
the flood, before God Almighty said, I'm going to wipe him out.
I can't stand him. Mankind, I can't stand him. He said, the wickedness of man
is great. Very opposite of what God. And
every imagination of the thoughts of his heart, that is, whatever
he can think up, whatever he can imagine to do that's bad
and evil, he'll do it. And he lays in his bed and thinks
about it. and conjures up the most evil
and wicked, and it's getting worse and worse. God is clearly
taking His hand off of this planet. And men are becoming like animals. And God said it's only evil.
This is what He said before He destroyed this planet the first
time. Man, it's only evil, continually. That means every day, all day,
until he goes to sleep and then even dreams wicked things. That's why David said, what is
man? Why would God have anything that God, who's holy? Who was
it? It was Eliphaz said, behold,
the moon it shineth not. The stars are not pure in his
sight. What about man who drinks iniquity like the water? And God said that about man.
But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. There is a sinner,
and he was a sinner just like everybody else until God had
mercy upon him. But God, who is rich in mercy, He actually shows mercy on many
of these despicable creatures. And it's God's mercy that He
doesn't allow things to get completely out
of control. He lets us see just enough to
hate sin and hate this world, but it's His mercy that He doesn't
allow men to do what they would really like to do. Restraining
grace is what it's called. And God's great glory and great
highways are that He shows mercy to the worst. To any and all. Look at verse 7. He says, Let
the wicked forsake his way. What wicked? Our Lord said all
manner of sin. It doesn't matter. He showed
in his dying hour, the Lord Jesus Christ in his dying hour took
the worst, the most despicable man on earth, that thief and
that murderer beside him, took him to glory. The chief, any, let the wicked,
he says, forsake his way. And the unrighteous, unrighteous,
what's that? Name something. All manner, the
Lord says, all manner of sin shall be forgiven. No matter
what it is. No matter who it is. This is
a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation. He said,
all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. And we just
don't know the half of it. But he says it's worthy of all
acceptation. Christ Jesus came into the world
to save sinners. And Paul said, I'm the chief. I'm a pattern. I was injurious,
persecutor, blasphemer, God-hater, but God. See, God's ways are not our ways. God has mercy on people that
you and I would have nothing to do with. If we were God, and
we were dealing with us, I wouldn't have put up with me. Would you? David. David, after
the Lord spoke to him through Nathan, and the Lord told David
what all he was going to do for him, the Lord reminded David
where He found him, following sheep, and where He put him,
on the throne, and how that he was going to have mercy, the
sure mercies of David. We read that the sheer mercies
of David, the Lord reminded him or told him that he was going
to have mercy on him forever and never remove that mercy from
him. And David said, here's what David
said. I love this. David said, is this the way of
man? No, no. God, that's why God says
my ways are not your ways. And he says up in verse 6, he
says, Seek ye the Lord while he may be found. Call upon him
while he's near. Seek, call for mercy. That's
what our greatest need. You don't hear people doing that
today, do you? You hear God's people do it. You'll hear when
God's people pray, when you read sermons by true gospel preachers,
you'll hear words like this throughout their prayers and throughout
their sermons and so forth, right? Mercy. This is our every sinner
saved by grace knows the one thing needful is that God will
have mercy. And every morning, every day,
right? That's why we love that Ecclesiastes
5, is it 12? His mercies are new every morning.
His compassions, they fail not. Why do we love that so much,
Nancy? Because we're sinners, that's
why. And it's of the Lord's mercies that we're not consumed. And
He changes not. Like Brother Marvin said, He
changes not. This is good news to us. Fear
not, thou worm Jacob. I am the Lord, I change not.
Therefore, you sons of Jacob shall not be consumed. Why? He
said you wouldn't. And this seeking the Lord and
this calling upon Him and this forsaking our way and our thoughts
and so forth, that's of the Lord's mercies. Over there in Isaiah
65, remember where he said, I am sought of them that ask not for
me. And only a saved sinner knows
what that means. He says, I am found of them that
sought me not. Those that seek the Lord, David
said it in Psalm 27. He said, when you said, seek
my face, I said, thy face I'll seek. But not until then, right? Seek thy face, he said, and so
all God's people do. They seek him. Call ye upon him,
whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord. Whosoever shall
call upon the name. I love that verse, don't you? Whosoever shall call upon the
name of the Lord shall be saved. Good news, isn't it? Well, who
will call? Well, that's taken from Joel
2.32, isn't it? For in Mount Zion and Israel shall be deliverance,
and the remnant whom the Lord our God shall call." Who will
call on the name of the Lord? The elect, God's elect, who He
calls by our gospel. That's of the Lord's mercy, you
see. Even the callings of the Lord's mercy. For whom He did
foreknow, He did predestinate. Whom He predestinated, He called. Let the wicked forsake his way."
Nobody is going to forsake a way that seems right to them. The
end of its destruction, nobody is going to forsake. There is
a way that seems right. And all we like sheep have gone
astray. We've turned everyone to our own way. But what? But God. It says, "...and return
unto the Lord." You return. You see, we've turned from the
Lord. We hear the gospel, every one of us. We hear it, we hear
the truth, and we turn from it. This is our natural response.
And I don't believe that. You will not come unto me, he
said. And we turn and we head our way. But God. And the psalmist says, turn me,
and I'll be turned. Turn me, and I'll return. We've turned once, and then God
turns us again. Return. Back to you, God. But you know, and look at it.
Verse seven says that he will have mercy upon him. Barbara,
it doesn't say he will offer mercy if they'll accept it. Does
it? God said, I will be gracious
to whom I will be. I will. He who works all things
after the counsel of his own will says, I will do this. I
will be gracious. It's not offered to us. It's
an act upon us. And He says, I will show mercy
to, not offer unto, I will show it to. I will reveal it. I will
display it. I will act upon them in mercy. They don't even know they need
it until I show them. And I'm going to make them cry
for it. And I will have mercy upon them. And look at this.
Verse 7, "...and for he will abundantly pardon." He will abundantly pardon. I wish Mary Magdalene could come
up here and tell her story to you right now. She was abundantly
pardoned. See, who has been forgiven much
will love this abundant pardon. St. David wrote this, have mercy
upon me, Lord, for my sin is great. Great pardon. Great sinners need
great pardon. And the Lord says, I will abundantly
pardon. Not just pardon, but justify. Not just justify, but glorify. Not just forgive you, adopt you. Not just take you off death row,
take you home with him. That's abundant pardon, just
a little bit of it. Abundant pardon. Look how willing,
how ready our God, Scripture says He's ready to pardon. Look
at verse 1, He says, everyone that thirsts, everyone. Nobody
can accuse us of saying that we don't come. We say, come,
whosoever will. We preach that normally. Barnard
said, whosoever will, that's not the problem. Whosoever will,
is made willing in the day of his power. Whosoever will, will
come. Bernard used to say the problem
is whosoever won't, they won't. Christ said you will not. But
he said all that the Father giveth me shall come to me. This is
the Father's will of all which he hath given me. I'll lose nothing.
They'll come. Everyone. That thirst, look at
what is required of us to come. Thirst. Come. Thirsty. We invite people over to eat
often because we want them. And we try to tell them not to
bring anything, but they always do. They just won't listen. The
last time I finally said, They brought something. I said, put
it back in your car. Don't bring that in here. Our Lord says,
come. What should I bring? Nothing
but thirst. You thirsty? Come. What if you
brought your little tater salad up to Solomon's table? I didn't want to come empty handed,
Brother Solomon. I didn't want to impose upon you. Impose? That's an insult. Come, thirsty, come to the waters. Oh, but you know, the Lord, I
don't know if He will show mercy to me. You know how much mercy
He's got to show? The waters. The waters. This earth is 70 some percent
water. It's the only planet that sustains
life. The Lord made it that way. The
water. Down in verse 10, He talks about the rain coming down, Watereth
the earth. The earth is the only one that
has water on it. That's a good picture of Christ, the water
of life. And this planet, forget about
any foolish notion that there's life on another planet. Just
forget that. Just forget that. This is it. And the Lord said
He's going to make a new heaven, a new earth. And it will be full
of the saints whom Christ has redeemed. There's not going to
be anybody else there. It's going to be people singing
about His glory. Christ would have had to die again for some
other fallen race. It's foolish. He goes on, verse
1 says, He that hath no money, come, buy. The reason he says
buy is because it's something that must be purchased,
but you're not going to purchase it. You don't have enough money. Your soul is too precious. No
man can redeem his soul, Scripture says, for whatever, by whatever. It took the precious blood of
the Lamb to redeem us. Cry. He said, buy the truth and
sell it not. It means sell whatever you have
in order to hear it. But it comes, you buy and eat.
Eat. Yea, come. Yes. Yea, yes. Me? Yes, you. Come. Not me, yes,
you. Everyone. Come, buy wine and
milk. These two things represent Christ's
blood and the Word. Sincere milk. Without money,
without price, why do you spend money for what's not bread? If
you said, if you'll hearken diligently, what is required? Just listen.
Thirst, hearkening, eat, incline your ear, come. Just here. It doesn't say do anything. That's good news. And he says,
and I will make with you an everlasting covenant. And I've got to quit. Look down at verse 10. He says, now, how do we know
that all this is so? Well, verse 4, he says, Behold,
I have given Him," who? The sure mercies of David, the
waters, the bread, Christ, as a witness to prove to you. God was manifest in the flesh
and He stood up, Jeanette, on that great day of the feast and
said, Oh, everyone that thirsts Him, remember that? Come unto
Me, all ye, all ye, all ye. that labor and heavy labor. I'll
give you rest. Out of your belly shall flow
rivers of living water. I'm the water of life. Come.
Thirsty? Come. Hungry? Come. I'm the witness
of God's mercy and grace, and a leader to lead us all the way
to glory. And commander. God's given commandment
to save me. And Christ is the captain of
that salvation. The commander. And he calls us,
and down in verse 10, have you ever thought of these verses
in reference to Christ? As the rain cometh down and the
snow from heaven, Scripture says that he shall come down like
rain on the mown grass. There's nothing sweeter than
after you mow the grass and the rain has a fragrance. That's
Christ, the rain, the water. Come down from heaven snow in
its purity, and returns not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh
it bring forth and bud." That's Christ, His fruit, His righteousness.
"...and gives seed to the sower, bread to the eater." Christ said,
I'm the bread of life. "...so shall My Word..." Christ is the Word. In the beginning
was the Word. The Word was with God. The Word
was God. "...goeth forth out of God." His mouth, it shall
not, He shall not return unto me void, but He shall accomplish
what I please. What's that? Salvation of my
people. The bringing in of an everlasting righteousness. He
shall prosper. God said, Behold My servant,
he'll prosper in the thing I sent him to do. And He says after
this, if you come, those that are thirsty, you come, you buy,
We sung that song. Lord, we plead what Jesus the
Lord has done. You come, you hearken, you eat
this gospel, you incline your ear, you hear, you look to Christ,
the witness, the leader, the commander, you seek the Lord
and He is found. You call upon Him for mercy.
You forsake the way that you think is right to believe Christ,
the way, the truth, the life. And our thoughts become His thoughts,
and we come back to the Lord by His grace and His mercy, and
He abundantly pardons us. And verse 12 says, you'll go
out with joy. And I hope somebody will go out
here tonight with more joy than when you came. You'll go out
with joy. Go out where? You'll go out of
this world. You'll not only go out of here, But you'll go out of this world
with joy. Mark the perfect man. The end of that man is peace.
And you'll be led forth with peace. Led forth. And the mountains
and the hills shall break forth before you in the singing. Not
only now. You know, when you first hear
the gospel, everything changes, doesn't it? One of the old writers said,
all the world, the mountains sing and the trees clap, and
the whole world is a symphony to the grace and mercy of God,
if you have ears to hear. And that's of the Lord. And instead
of the thorn, verse 13, because of man's sin, there's a curse
on the thorns, but Christ has removed the curse. So what will
come up is the fir tree. Beautiful. Everlasting. Evergreen
tree. And instead of the briar, shall
come up the myrtle tree. That's my favorite tree. Great
myrtle. I don't know if that's safe.
And what's it all about? It's to the Lord for a name. It's for a name. To His great
name. And that's what Moses, he said
to Moses, he said, I'll proclaim... Listen to this. I'm going to
make my goodness pass before you. And I want to proclaim the
name of the Lord. Here it is. Listen. I want to
proclaim the name of the Lord. He says, the Lord, the Lord,
the Lord God. Merciful. My thoughts are not
your thoughts. We know in what centers we are. Especially sinners against God's
mercy. That makes us feel like we're
worse than we were before God saved us. Because we sin against
love, we sin against mercy, we sin against grace. But God's
ways are not our ways. You can't sin away His mercy. Isn't that good news? His thoughts are not our thoughts,
and our ways are not His ways. As high His mercy is in the heavens,
His faithfulness to the clouds. He said, can a mother forsake
her child? Yes, but I can't. I won't. I will not. It's an
everlasting sign, He says. It will not be cut off. Okay,
stand with me.