I am bound for the promised land. Amen. Please open your Bibles to Isaiah
chapter 56. Isaiah chapter 56. We'll read the whole chapter. Thus saith the Lord, keep ye
judgment 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 keeping his hand from doing
any 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 unto
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
of sons and of 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 and 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 them
will I bring to my holy mountain and make them joyful in my house
of prayer. Their burnt offerings and their
sacrifices shall be accepted upon mine altar, for mine house
shall be called a house of prayer for all people. The Lord God,
which gathereth the outcasts of Israel, saith, Yet will I
gather others to him beside those that are gathered unto him. All ye beasts of the field, come
to devour. Yea, all ye beasts in the forest. His watchmen are blind. They
are all ignorant. They are all dumb dogs. They
cannot bark, sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber. Yea, they're greedy dogs which
can never have enough. And they are shepherds that cannot
understand. They all look for their own way.
Everyone for his gain from his quarter. Come ye, say they, I
will fetch wine and we will fill ourselves with strong drink and
tomorrow shall be as this day and much more abundant. Heavenly Father, we do thank
you in your good providence that you have set this time aside
for us to gather together as a congregation in, as it were,
our house of prayer that you have set aside for us here. Father,
we confess that as we are by nature sinners and by practice
sinners, we have no right. We have no holiness. We have
no righteousness. We have no honor to come unto
thee and praise thee and make requests unto thee. But, Father,
we are not coming by ourselves. We are coming in our advocates.
We are coming in the name of our Savior. We are coming through
our prophet, priest, and king, the Lord Jesus Christ. And Father,
we confess as a congregation that when the fullness of time
was to come, You set forth and brought forth Your Son, made
under the law to redeem them that were under the law. And
we confess, Father, that Jesus Christ walked this earth and
He never sinned. He never even thought a sin.
And in his life culminating in an atonement on the cross, he
accomplished salvation for thy people. Salvation has been accomplished
in our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. So, Father, to him we
desire to give all praise and honor and glory tonight. Father,
we do confess that if we make this confession, it's because
the Holy Spirit has come and regenerated us and converted
us so that we look to Jesus Christ and him alone as the only ground
of our salvation. So, Father, we do thank you that
you've been pleased to bring us here at this time to worship
you and to pray to you. We do pray for this congregation,
Father. We thank you that you've been
pleased to raise up a gospel light in our area. And we consider
all our backgrounds and personalities. And in your province, you've
gathered us together for one sole purpose tonight, is to hear
the gospel and to glorify thee. We pray that you would be pleased
to bless us, for without Christ, we can do nothing spiritually.
And what we pray for ourselves, we pray for all who gather at
this time to worship you under the true gospel throughout the
world. Father, in our news, in our country,
there's an election coming up and leaders will be chosen. And
Father, it is as it is in your word says that the lot is cast
into the lap. That's our vote, but yet the
whole disposing thereof is of the Lord. So, Father, we pray
that whoever you have ordained to be our leaders in our government
this week, We pray, Father, that we be allowed to live comfortably
and peacefully in this present life, and you would allow us
to continue to worship you without government intervention. For,
Lord, here in this country we take that for granted, but in
many countries for our other brethren it is not so. So we
do thank you for the religious freedom that we have to gather
and worship you. Father, as the body of Christ
here in our area, we mourn with those who mourn. Weep with those
who weep and rejoice with those who rejoice. We pray for those
who have lost loved ones this week. We pray for the immediate
families. We pray for those who are in
rest homes right now and in hospitals. We pray for our brethren who
will be undergoing medical tests this week. Father, we consider
them and we join in with them in prayer. Rejoice that thy will
be done. And Father, we'll rejoice now
in your will that you'll bring two gospel preachers here shortly
to have a Bible conference. We pray that you'd bless all
the activities that are involved in that and that your son would
be honored in the preaching of the gospel and you'd bless those
men and bring them here safely. We pray for this young man from
England who is coming here to visit for a week and to be baptized
in your will on Wednesday. Father, you've been pleased to
use this man, Chris Alderman, to get your gospel out all over
the world through the Internet. So we just pray that you bring
him here safely and we'd have a time of fellowship with him. Now, Father, we pray that you
would bless our pastor with the word that you have given him
this week out of this word. We thank you, Father, that you've
been pleased to give us a faithful gospel minister, and we pray
that you would give him great liberty in the Spirit tonight
to preach unto us once again Christ Jesus and him crucified,
for your people is the greatest story we can hear. So we want
to give you all the praise and honor and glory tonight, for
we pray it in Jesus' name. Amen. If you would, Whitney, turn your
hymnals to page 511. 511. Face to face. Let's stand
as we sing. Face to face with Christ my Savior,
face to face what will it be, when with rapture I behold Him,
Jesus Christ who died for me. Face to face I shall behold Him
far beyond the starry sky. Face to face in all His glory
I shall see Him by and by. Only faintly now I see Him with
the darkling veil between. But a blessed day is coming when
His glory Face to face I shall behold Him,
far beyond the starry sky. Face to face in all His glory
I shall see Him by and by. What rejoicing in His presence
when our banished grief and pain When the crooked ways are straightened,
And the dark things shall be plain, Face to face I shall behold
Him, Far beyond the starry sky. Face to face in all his glory,
I shall see him by and by. Face to face, O blissful moment,
face to face to see and know. Face to face with my Redeemer,
Jesus Christ, who loves me so. Face to face I shall behold Him. Far beyond the starry sky, face
to face in all his glory, I shall see him by and by. Be seated, please. Now in that passage that Brother
Craig read, Isaiah 56, we're going to tonight hopefully look
at the first eight verses. You may have noticed as he read
through that, that at verse 9 there's sort of a change of tone there. And many commentators say, well
this is just somebody made a mistake. It seems like that Isaiah just
got off onto a different subject, but believe me, they are related.
And let me show you what I mean by that. I've entitled this message,
God's Call to Righteousness. God's Call to Righteousness. Now, that's what the preaching
of the Gospel is. That's just another way of saying
preaching the good news of salvation. all of salvation, the whole of
salvation, by God's grace in Christ. It is a call to righteousness. It is a call to Christ Himself
who is our righteousness. And it is a call to righteousness
by way of obedience unto Him, seeking to obey Him. Now, in
the first eight verses of this chapter, You see that it is the
work of God in calling His people to salvation, to righteousness
as it were, to bring His people together, to gather His people
together, to unite brethren around one common ground and interest,
and that is the call to righteousness, the person and work of Christ,
His truth, obedience to His will and His way. And that's the work
of God. And He uses His true ministers
as agents, instruments, to preach the Word of God, to preach the
Gospel of God, and the Word of God, just for that purpose, to
bring His people. Now, God does the work. It's
the power of God unto salvation. It's not the power of the preacher.
We're just instruments. But this is the work of God.
And in verse 9, what he's talking about there is the leaders of
Israel in Isaiah's day who were in actuality false shepherds
because they were doing just the opposite. Instead of seeking
to gather together in fellowship and in unity and in love the
people of God, what they were doing is out of their own selfish
reasons they were scattering the people of God. And you know
that's usually the case when believers divide. They're usually
following what? Some man. Isn't that right? And that's what he describes
in the last part of this chapter. Isaiah is speaking to his day
again. You know, the message of Isaiah
is a timeless message. It's the gospel of God's grace
in Christ. That's the message of Scripture
from Genesis to Revelation. And it will be until the end
of time when our Lord comes back. Isaiah spoke and speaks of God's
promise to send his Messiah. Back in the first part of this
book of Isaiah, we've covered quite a bit of it, haven't we?
We've got about 11 more chapters to go after this. But in the
first part of this book, Isaiah wrote mainly of his own day,
and Christ was presented as the only Savior to whom sinners should
look to and rest in and serve from the heart Not with religious
ceremony, not just with outward profession, but serve Him from
the heart. Sincerely, lovingly, being convinced
by the Spirit that we're sinners and we don't have any hope of
salvation apart from Him. Who is, as Isaiah saw it in his
day, Him who was to come. He who is promised of God to
be their Savior. And then he wrote in some verses
here of the future. He spoke of a time in the future
when the nation Israel would be in captivity, conquered by
the Babylonian Empire. How they would be in captivity,
but he also spoke of the deliverance from that captivity. And Christ
was presented over and over again in that part as the future deliverer,
not just of national Israel, but of all Israel, spiritual
Israel, out of every tribe, kindred, tongue, and nation. God has a
people that He chose before the foundation of the world out of
every nation. And we certainly can enter into
the joy of that, can't we? Now, aren't you glad that God
chose a people out of every tribe, tongue, and nation? Well, here
in chapter 55 begins the final section of Isaiah. And here it
seems that Isaiah returns to his own day, speaking to Israel,
speaking to Jerusalem of his own day. And he deals mainly
with the daily religious life of the people. And these chapters
begin and end with something that's real significant. And
I want you to don't miss this, because we're going to see this
call to righteousness. And how God's true ministers
are to conduct themselves in the ministry of righteousness.
You know, that's what Paul called the New Covenant, the gospel
ministry in 2 Corinthians chapter 3. He called it the ministry
of the Spirit. He called it the ministry of
life. He called it the ministry of righteousness. And if I'm
going to be a faithful pastor, and not be a divider of brethren,
I need to listen to what these chapters in Isaiah says. And
there's something significant here. These chapters begin and
end with talking about the Sabbath. Did you notice as Craig read
down through there how many times he mentioned the keeping of a
Sabbath? Here in chapter 56, look at verses 1 and 2. He says,
Thus saith the Lord, keep ye judgment. Now you might have
in your concordance in your Bible there the word equity. And what
that means is fairness. fairness and honesty, treating
people equally, not showing favoritism, has to do with judging rightly. Now, we know man by nature will
not judge rightly. That's just us by nature. We
cannot judge without prejudice. That's why Christ told His disciples,
He said, do not judge by outward appearance, John 7, 24. He said,
but judge righteous judgment. How are we, who are sinners,
who don't know any better and cannot know any better on our
own. How are we going to judge righteously? Well, there's only
one way. We have to bow to God's judgment
in this Word. That's the only way. God is the
one who judges according to the truth. That's one of the main
truths that God sets forth through the Apostle Paul in Romans chapter
2. Man's judgment is always flawed. God's judgment is always fair. It's with equity. And it's always
in truth. God never punishes where punishment
is not deserved. Did you know that? And let me
tell you something. God never saves where He cannot
be just in doing so. He must be just when He saves.
He must be equitable when He saves a sinner. Well, how can
He save me when I deserve punishment? Well, that's grace. That's what
the Gospel is all about. He punished the Son of God, Christ,
in our place. There was punishment due, punishment
owed, and He punished Christ on the cross for the sins of
His people. So he says, keep ye judgment,
and do justice, for my salvation is near to come, and my righteousness
to be revealed. Now look at verse 2, he says,
blessed is the man that doeth this, and the son of man that
layeth hold on it. Now the son of man there is talking
about human beings there. Sometimes you'll see that phrase,
the son of man in scripture, and it's a messianic term referring
to Christ. For example, the son of David.
But here he's talking about us. Talking about human beings. And
he says, Son of man that layeth hold on it, that keepeth the
Sabbath from polluting it, and keepeth his hand from doing evil.
So there you have the Sabbath. And it crops up in that chapter,
the first eight verses, quite a bit. But it goes through this
whole section of Isaiah. Look over at Isaiah 58. Look
at Isaiah 58 and look at verse 13. This is important in the
daily religious life of Israel. But I want to put it to you this
way now. It's also important. It's necessary in our daily life. And I'll show you what I mean
by that. But look at verse 13 of Isaiah 58. He says, If thou
turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my
holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord
honorable, and shall honor him, not doing thine, that is, honor
God, you see, by keeping the Sabbath, not doing thine own
ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words,
then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord, and I will cause
thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with
the heritage of Jacob thy father." That's salvation now. And he
says, "...for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it." Keeping
the Sabbath. And then one more. Look over
at the last chapter of Isaiah. Isaiah 66. And look at verse
23. This is how Isaiah's prophecy ends. And he says in
verse 23, and it shall come to pass that from one new moon to
another and from one sabbath to another shall all flesh come
to worship before me, saith the Lord. You see that? From one
sabbath to another, all flesh. And that's what he's talking
about. He's talking about his people. And he keeps that theme of the
Sabbath running all the way through this, the keeping of the Sabbath.
Why is that so significant? Well, in the day of Israel under
the old covenant, that certainly had an application to the keeping
of the seventh-day Sabbath, the fourth commandment, given by
Moses from Sinai. But that Sabbath was a picture
of something greater. What does the Sabbath mean? The
word Sabbath means rest. Resting. Resting is always a
good thing, isn't it? Never an evil thing. And that's what he's talking
about. That Sabbath day rest. They kept that day, the seventh
day Sabbath, and it was given for the life of that nation,
for their good, And to distinguish them is one of the ways God distinguished
them. God distinguished that nation
in several ways throughout their history. He distinguished them
with the covenant of Abraham, even before Moses. He distinguished
them with the Ten Commandments and the ceremony along the tabernacle.
Circumcision, all those things distinguished the people of God
from the nations of the world. And the Sabbath was very significant
in this. It was a distinctive mark. Some
say it was the sign of the Old Covenant, and I believe it was.
The sign of the Old Covenant. Every covenant had a sign, you
remember. Noah's covenant had a sign. The
Ark. Abraham's circumcision. The Old
Covenant. The Sinai Covenant. The sign
of it was the Sabbath. What's significant? Well, that's
seventh-day Sabbath. God never, under that covenant,
told them that they could be saved or made righteous or made
holy by the keeping of a day. He never told them that. But
they were required to keep the day. Now, why? What did He say
there? To honor Him. They were to honor
God. And what did that Sabbath represent? It represented eternal rest,
spiritual rest in the person and finished work of the Lord
Jesus Christ. Now, we're not required in the
New Covenant to keep a seventh-day Sabbath. Now, that doesn't shock
you all, because you've heard that for a long time. But you
know, that's a shocking statement to a lot of people. Especially
to the Seventh-day Adventists. Because it undercuts their whole
religion. We are not required to keep the Sabbath. Why? Now,
why? Because the Old Covenant has been abolished. That which
is old has waxed, grown, passed away. And the reason is because
Christ, who is our eternal spiritual Sabbath, has come. and finish
the work. And we do keep a Sabbath. Somebody
asked me one time, he said, are you a Sabbath keeper? And I said,
I sure am. And they asked me this, they
said, what day? Saturday or Sunday? I said, neither
one. I should have said Thursday.
But I didn't. I didn't. I said, I don't keep
any day. Christ is my Sabbath. Now that's
what's being taught here in the call to righteousness. The call
to righteousness begins with resting in Christ for all salvation. And without resting in Christ
for all salvation, you say, There is no call to righteousness.
There is no righteousness at all. You see, the call to righteousness
is not a call for sinners to try to establish and work out
a righteousness of their own. The call to righteousness is
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved. Now,
are we to live a life of righteousness? Yes. But what is a life of righteousness? It's a life of grace. resting
in Christ and seeking to do His will, not to be saved, but because
we already are. And every commandment, you remember
when we studied the feast days in the book of Leviticus, the
Feast of the Weeks and the Days and the Times, every one of them
began with what? Keeping the Sabbath. That means
the whole life of a believer, everything a believer tries to
do, seeks to do in growth and grace and in knowledge, is always
to begin and end with resting in Christ. We're never commanded
to do anything in a legal way or in a mercenary way. You ask
what religion is? They're either legalists or mercenaries.
What is a legalist? A legalist is trying to make
himself righteous by his works. What's a mercenary? He's trying
to get paid for it. Here's what they call it, earning
your rewards in heaven. But that's a mercenary. You see,
they're trying to serve God for what they can get out of Him.
Not because of His intrinsic value. But God says here, He
says, you're going to do it to what? To honor Me. To honor God. Now let's look at it. There are
two things here. We see, first of all, a righteousness provided
and a righteousness commanded. Look at it again, verse 1, Thus
saith the Lord, Keep ye judgment, be fair, be honest, and do justice. Why? What's the basis? What's
the ground of my, you know, in my sinful self? I have to fight,
I have to war to do what's right. And I never do what's right perfectly.
I mean, it's a constant battle, isn't it? You know something
of what I'm talking about, don't you? Isn't it a constant battle?
You say, well, every day it's a warfare. It's called the warfare
of the flesh and the spirit. And we're to fight it. We're
never to give up. Somebody said, well, he's a tired old warrior
and he's just giving up. Not in this book they don't. Our sister Sue, her warfare is
over. But ours isn't. We're still here on this earth.
Her warfare is over. Thank God. I look forward to
that day when our warfare is over. But right now it's a warfare. It's a fight. It's a hard task. Why should we do it? Here's why. Look at it in verse 1. For my
salvation is near to come and my righteousness to be revealed. There it is. Salvation by God's
grace in Christ. There's the basis for it. There's
the motivation for it. There's the energy of it. There's
everything about it. It's based upon, motivated by,
and it centers around the grace of God in salvation. That's what
he's talking about. Righteous living, as we call
it, is commanded in light of and on the basis of the grace
of God in salvation accomplished and freely provided in the promised
Messiah. That's what Isaiah is telling
his people of his day. He said, yes, we're to do our
best to obey God. And we're to always be honest,
honest before God and honest before men. Lord, I'm a sinner.
At my best moment, I'm a sinner. But we're to fight sin. Why?
Because God's salvation is near to come and His righteousness
to be revealed. God is telling the people of
Isaiah's day that He's going to send His salvation for His
people. And you know, God's grace never
denies or discourages or hinders obedience in any way. When the
Lord Himself preached salvation freely by His grace, by His work,
the Pharisees called Him a devil. They called Him a lawbreaker.
They said He was preaching against the laws of Moses. When the Apostle
Paul preached the gospel of grace throughout the world, The Jews
constantly accused him of promoting sin. They said, well, shall we
sin the more that grace may abound? You remember in Romans 6? And
he said, God forbid. You know, people today see it
the same. I was talking to one of my good friends and a brother
in Auburn, and he said he was trying to witness to a man, a
friend of his, trying to tell him what he believed. And the
fellow, the first thing he popped up and said, he said, well, it
sounds to me it's just an excuse to sin. And that's the way it
sounds to the natural man. And you know why it is? Because
the only motivation that the natural man has to obey is a
legal mercenary motive. That's all he's got. That's all
he's got. It's got to be the whip of the
law to whip him into submission. It's got to be dangling the carrot
in front of him to get him to move forward. That's all he knows. And one man said one time to
one of the old Puritans, they said, well, you're taking away
all my motivation to obedience. And the man said, you're exactly
right, and that needs to be taken away. But you see, when God takes
that evil motivation away that causes sinners to bring forth
fruit unto death, you know what He does? He replaces it with
a better motive, a greater motive. And what is that motive? It's
called love. It's called grace. It's called
gratitude. Paul said, the love of Christ
constrains me. What constrains me? What motivates
me? It's the unmerited, unmeasured
love of God in Christ. And I'll tell you, we even have
to fight those old legal motives that we still have, don't we?
That's part of the warfare, isn't it? But this is what we're saying. The gospel of God's grace commands
and encourages obedience to the Word of God, not to be saved,
not to be holy, and not to be righteous, but because you already
are. We're to follow after righteousness.
There's no doubt about it. The Bible says, "...let your
light so shine before men that they may see your..." what? "...good
works." And do what? "...glorify your Father which
is in heaven." The light's not our good works. The light is
the gospel of God's grace. in Christ that shines on those
works and shows that they're not motivated by legalism or
mercenary motives, that they're motivated by grace. The Bible
says in Ephesians 2 and chapter 10, we are His workmanship created
in Christ Jesus unto, not because of, but unto good works which
God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. That's
what Isaiah is talking about in this chapter. That's what
holds God's people together. We have a common salvation, a
common faith, we have a common rest. Our rest is in Christ. If you're resting in Christ for
your whole salvation, you're my brother or my sister in Christ.
And let me tell you something, we've got no reason to divide.
If we're seeking to do what's right as we're motivated by love
and grace and gratitude, we've got no reason to divide. Now,
if you've got some other motive, promoting self, promoting a man
or promoting a group, then we're not together. But as long as
we're called unto righteousness, we're together. God's gathering
His people together. All of these issues of grace,
you see. And I'll tell you, there's no
other message like it, is there? I mean, there's no other message
like it on the face of the earth. That's sort of the basis of all
this. Look here, he said the salvation that he reveals in
the gospel is God's salvation. He said, my salvation is me. He's the author of it. He's the
finisher of it. He's the provider of it. He's
the revealer of it. He's the applicator of it. He's
the keeper of it. It's his. It belongs to him.
He gives it to his people. He gives that which belongs to
him to us in Christ. The salvation proclaimed in the
gospel is the revelation of God's righteousness. He's both a just
God and a Savior. Isaiah has dealt with that so
many times in this book happening. God's honor and glory is involved
in here. You cannot honor God, no matter
what you do, until you rest in the Lord Jesus Christ. Did you
know that? I mean, you can be as religious
as you want to be, you can be as dedicated as you want to be,
you can be as loving as you want to be, charitable, anything you
do, you can do your best today, start it today, to obey all the
commandments of God. But you cannot honor God until
you first believe in and rest and trust His beloved Son. Without
faith, it's impossible to please God. The salvation that God provides
is a person. The Lord Jesus Christ, just like
Simeon, held up that baby and said, for mine eyes have seen
thy salvation. Now I'm ready to die. The saints
of God in the Old Testament, they saw this salvation as something
that God promised. And He justified them based upon
the blood and righteousness of the Christ to come. We look back
upon the finished work of Christ. And there are three things commanded
here for all who worship and serve the Lord. Number one, look
at it, keep ye judgment and do justice. Live honestly. Live
honestly before God and before men. Come before God as a sinner
seeking mercy all the time, every day. Realize that you never,
you never deserve and you never earn the salvation that God freely
gives out of His mercy in Christ. There's not one second of my
life that I can say, now I've earned it, now I deserve it.
And let me tell you something, that's the way it's going to
be forever. Did you know that? Even in heaven. These guys that
come up and say, well, when I enter heaven, I can say, well, I've
earned this much. You haven't earned anything. You better take
your place. You better keep judgment. That's what that means. You better
do justice. You better say it this way, if
God gave me at any time what I've earned and what I deserve,
it'd be a sinner's hell. That's being honest, isn't it?
But see, go further. Don't stop there and wallow in
sorrow and despair because that's not what this call to righteousness
is about. This call to righteousness is
not given to God's people to beat us down and make us crawl
out the back doors if we don't have any hope. This call to righteousness
is a call to Christ. Be honest about Christ, too.
He's my Savior. He's my Redeemer. He's my surety. He's my substitute. He's my sin-bearer. He's my righteousness. And I
can stand boldly before the throne of a holy God in Christ, washed
in His blood, clothed in His righteousness. Be honest about
that, too. You say, well, but He can't save me. You're not
being honest. He can save anybody He wants
to save. You say, well, I'm too sinful. Not for Him. You are
for me, and I am for you. But not for Him. He's the Savior
of sinners, isn't He? He gives peace and comfort. He says, peace be still. He gives
righteousness. You know who's going to be righteous
in God's sight? in Christ, anybody who wants
to be in Christ. Anybody. He'll never turn a sinner
away who comes pleading the blood of His Son. He never will. Never has, never will. Here's
the second thing. Keep the Sabbath day. Trust Christ
alone as your Savior. Rest in Him. Look at Hebrews
chapter 4. We've seen this chapter quite
a bit, but let's look at it again. Hebrews chapter 4. The Hebrew children, he said,
that came out of Egypt, they were forbidden to enter into
the promised land because of unbelief. They didn't enter into the rest
because of unbelief. The rest of that land that God
gave them. He told them, God told them,
He said, you don't deserve the land and you didn't earn the
land, I'm giving it to you. When they sent their spies over
there, the majority came back and said, well, we can't take
it, we're not powerful enough, they're too big over there, they're
giants over there. I mean, what God said was true,
the land's flowing with milk and honey, this is a fertile
land, but there's guys over there that's so big, we can't beat
them. And here there was two fellas that came back from that
mission, Caleb and Joshua, and remember what they said? Caleb
spoke up, and he said, wait a minute, fellas, you're thinking of this
thing all wrong. He said, it's not by our power
that we'll take that land. God's already given us the land.
Let's just have it, he said. We'll just have it. That's all
you got to do, just have it. Why will sinners go to hell?
It's because they won't have what God freely gives. That's
what 1 Corinthians 2 says about the natural man, who won't receive
the things of the Spirit of God. Read up there in verse 12 sometime.
It says, they won't receive that which is what? Freely given. And you know why a man by nature
won't receive what's freely given? Because he's too proud. You've
got to give me something to do. You've got to give me some way
to earn at least a little something of it. You mean to tell me that
it's just freely given? That's exactly what he means
to tell you. It's freely given. Look at Hebrews
4. He says in verse 8, now Joshua led him over into the promised
land. That promised land was a picture of the rest that we
as believers in Christ have in Him. And he says in verse 8,
for if Jesus, that word Jesus there is Joshua. That's the one
who fought the battle of Jericho now. If Joshua had given them
rest, then would he not afterward have spoken of another day? Now
Joshua spoke of the Messiah to come and the eternal rest that
believers have in him. So in other words, what he's
saying here is that when Joshua led them over into the promised
land, that actual land, that physical land, if he had given
the rest, the eternal rest there, he wouldn't have spoken of a
rest to come. But he did. And who was it? Well, look at
verse 9. There remaineth therefore a rest, a sabbath to the people
of God. What is that sabbath? Verse 10.
For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from
his old works, as God did from his. Now who's he talking about
there? He's talking about the work of Christ, that calvary,
to put away our sins. Just like God rested when He
created this world. He rested on the seventh day. That's not meaning God got tired
and had to quit. That just means God was finished.
And He was glorified and honored. When Christ obeyed the law and
went to the cross of Calvary, He did a great work. Oh, it was
a hard work. But He, as God's man, did the
work. He did all the work. And when He said it's finished,
and that's what He said, John 19, verse 30, it's finished,
then the rest was brought in. He is our Sabbath. We rest in
Him. We do cease from our labors.
Look at verse 11. Let us labor therefore to enter
into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of
unbelief. We cease from our labors in that
we stop trying to work our way into heaven. Trying to work our
way to righteousness. And we rest in the finished work
of Christ. Go back to Isaiah 56 now. The surest way to promote righteousness
is to preach free grace in Christ. Grace teaches righteousness.
But now from verse 3 to verse 8, now here's what the point
is. Now here's what Isaiah is telling Jerusalem in verses 3
through 8. He's saying this is for anybody
who wants it. This is for any stranger. He even mentions eunuchs. What is a eunuch? It's a man
who cannot have a child. There's no fruit, no offspring.
And he says this is for any person, any nation, any tribe, any country. It's not just for Israel. It's
not just for the Jew. It's for the Gentile too. Listen
to him. Look at verse 3. He says, "...neither let the
son of the stranger," that's the foreigner, the non-Jew, the
Gentile, "...that hath joined himself to the Lord," what's
he doing? He joins himself to the people
of God. He rests in Christ. Neither let him speak, saying,
The Lord hath utterly separated me from his people." In other
words, that stranger is no longer on the outside looking in. He's
right there in the family of God. He's no longer separated
from the people of God. He's part of the family. He's
part of the kingdom. He's a full-fledged citizen in
the kingdom of heaven. Why? Because he's joined himself
to the Lord. He's resting in the Lord. And then he says, let the eunuchs
say, behold, I'm a dry tree. Neither let the eunuchs say,
I'm a dry tree. I have no children. I have no offspring. Verse 4,
for thus saith the Lord unto the eunuchs that keep my Sabbaths.
Now what's that a picture of? That's a picture of an unfruitful,
barren sinner resting in Christ. You see, that's what we are by
nature. We're unfruitful and barren. But in Christ, you see,
we keep His Sabbath. We rest in Christ and choose
the things that please God. Well, He said, this is My beloved
Son in whom I am well pleased. Hear ye Him. And take hold of
My covenant. Now, when you take hold of the
covenant, that's the same thing as believing the Gospel. When
you believe the Gospel, you know what you did? You took hold of
the covenant. The everlasting covenant. God
already had a hold on you. You just didn't know it. But
when you believed the Gospel, when you rested in Christ, and
when you came to Him as a beggar seeking mercy, then you laid
hold of Him. He is our covenant. Remember,
He said that a few chapters back. Christ is our covenant. So we
took hold of the covenant. And look at verse 5. He says,
Even unto them will I give in mine house and within my walls
a place. You have a place in the Kingdom
of God. If the Son therefore make you
free, you'll be free indeed. And you have a permanent, everlasting,
abiding place and a name better than the sons and of daughters,
better than having children here on earth. This is better, he
said. And I will give them an everlasting
name. It will never be taken away.
You can never lose it. It's by grace. It's in Christ. You can't be saved one day and
lost the next. Not if you've taken hold of this
covenant. Now those who take hold of another covenant, a covenant
of works, they can be lost. They can think they're saved,
but they're always lost. He said, His everlasting name,
that shall not be cut off. You remember when Isaiah saw
his sins back in chapter 6, he said, I'm undone. That literally
means I'm cut off. In my sins, I'm cut off. My only
hope is to be found in him. Verse 6, also the sons of the
stranger that join themselves to the Lord, even the foreigners,
the Gentiles' children that join themselves to the Lord, that
believe in Christ, to serve Him and to love the name of the Lord,
only those who know Christ, who rest in Him, saved by the grace
of God, are those who love the name of the Lord. They love His
glory. And he says to be his servants,
his bond servants, not legal slaves forced to do a work in
order to pay a debt, but those whose debts are already paid.
Loving bond slaves, willing bond slaves, everyone that keepeth
the Sabbath from polluting it. How do you keep the Sabbath from
polluting it? You look to Christ alone. Not mixed. It's not Christ
plus anything. It's not Christ plus my works,
Christ plus my experience, not even Christ plus my faith. It's
just Christ and Him alone for all the salvation. And then he
says, and take a hold of my covenant. That's it. You believe the gospel.
Verse 7, even them will I bring to my holy mountain. That's Mount
Zion. That's the church. That's the
end gathering of the people. and make them joyful in my house
of prayer." It's a house of prayer because we have a great intercessor.
We have a high priest who's seated at the right hand of the Father
in the heavenlies ever living to make intercession. We have
open access to God Almighty in Christ. One mediator between
God and sinners, the man Christ Jesus. And he says, "...and their
burnt offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted upon my altar."
That's their service unto Him. And why is it accepted? Because
it's upon the altar. In other words, it's accepted
in Christ. He's our altar. That's the only
way anything of us or from us is accepted before God in Christ.
It has to be washed in His blood and clothed in His righteousness
because anything that comes through us or in us or from us is imperfect. But see, it's on the altar here.
It's the reasonable service that Paul spoke of in Romans chapter
12, of a child of God. And then he says, for mine house
shall be called a house of prayer, for who? For all people. Now
that's not all without exception. That's all without distinction. Who are the all here? All who
join themselves to the Lord. All who believe in and rest in
Christ for all of salvation. His house is a house of prayer. You have, listen, you have just,
you who have joined yourself to Christ, you have just as much
right and free access in prayer to God as any person in this
building. And you know that's what unites
us together. We have a common, free access to God in Christ.
Look at verse 8. He says, The Lord God, which
gathereth the outcast of Israel, saith, Yet will I gather others
to him beside those that are gathered unto him. God has a
people out of every tribe, kindred, tongue, and nation. Christ redeemed
them, and he will not fail to have them, to gather them in
to his house. Because we are in his house,
we're in his household. all who look to Him and rest
in Him for salvation. Now that's the goal of every
gospel preacher, to unite and pray that God will gather in
and unite His people in the house of prayer, the house of worship,
the house of rest.